The Test

Haha, woops!  Wrong video.

What a dumb sport.

There is no official video for the bike race, but here is the site, and some excellent pictures below thanks to Anne.  The Test of Metal is a 67km point to point XC mountain bike race, and is one of the iconic races in BC.  This was my first Test of Metal ever this year (I know, I know).  Going in I knew it was a fast race, but I soon learned:  it is a really fast race.



The first two thirds of the race went great.  I got myself into a pretty good spot in the first few pavement kilometers, and settled into the paceline up Jacks.   I traded pulls with a few other people up Alice Lake until we caught a bigger group at the top of the climb, which was very helpful all the way to the aid station.



You know what makes great bike race?  Having a crew.  Many thanks to Anne and Schomberg for the water bottle hand offs as well as the pictures.

I continued to pass people up the 9 Mile climb through Bonk Hill and the Lava Flow Hill.  This was my first time down the Ring Creek Rip, and it was awesome.  Then I got to the Plunge, made it halfway down, and wrecked pretty hard.

I chose a really poor time to go down.  It was a 30km/h to dead stop type of crash, and a large rock and my left thigh worked together to do all the stopping.  Which means I am pedaling all on one side... which at this point in the race means instant cramps.  Competition time over, I continued on through Crumpit woods (why do I never have a good time in Crumpit woods?) and was very happy to get to the finish line.

So I guess this means I'll be back for round 2 next year.  Looking at finishing times of people I was racing with, a sub-3 hour should be within reach.

I'll try to avoid the large rocks.

Extending the season (in between bike rides)

The late winter has not been kind to most resorts... but I just heard Whistler will be open until June 7th this year.  It is still full on winter up high.




As for the other resorts; depending on whether you are bothered more by crowds or by a bit of hiking, there are good days to be had.

Elfin Lakes Hut Overnight

I'll start this post with saying we are a little bit behind on our posts... we are working to correct that.  For the next while, we will be writing a little bit in the past :)

A couple of weeks ago we decided to take a group of friends (some experienced and some with little backcountry/winter experience) to Elfin Lakes Shelter.  We figured it was the perfect place to introduce people to the backcountry - a beautiful snowshoe through the sub-alpine to a heated hut.

We headed out from Vancouver at 5am to beat the rush to the hut - I've heard rumors of 100+ people in the 34 bed hut.  The weather was grey and dull and started snowing hard before we reached the parking lot.  At the lower parking lot we chained up and left the two Jettas to get to the top lot. We set off in the snow! First stop was the Red Heather day shelter where we rested up and had a snack. I love snacks.

On the trail up to the Elfin shelter, we ran into this guy and couldn't resist asking him for a picture.

  Even though it was grey and snowing, the terrain was still beautiful.

  We got a little cold as the wind picked up on Paul's Ridge, so we pressed on for the hut.

Finally we reached the hut and had snacks (snacks!) and grabbed bunks before the crowds showed up. We were lucky and got eight of the last ten or twelve spaces. By the end of the evening there were probably close to fifty people.

After a fantastic dinner and a couple of games of Dutch Blitz (my new favourite game!) I got ready for bed and headed outside for a bit. It was starting to clear!

When I got up in the morning, the fog was rolling in but the mountains looked perfect! We rounded up everyone to take a look before it got clouded in.

It was cold (probably -15) but still and beautiful. Matt's knee had been bothering him the day before so Alex and I decided we would ski some laps on the way home while Matt hung out with the snowshoers. The powder was amazing! We ran 4 laps in two hours breaking trail the whole time, but oh was it worth it!

We ended up running into the snowshoers at the top of one of our runs and Matt decided to join us for a few.  Alex's track is in the centre/rightish of the picture, Matt's are on the left and mine are to the right of Alex's.

We all enjoyed perfect conditions on a wonderful day!

Now that this has turned into a photo blog, one last one. Matt took this when we stopped to take off our chains on the way down.

 
I hope everyone had a good time!