EWS Adventure 2022

muddybike

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
So today was supposed to be the course walk-through. I say 'supposed to' because it was later in the day and it was just BLUE skies everywhere. I could not, NOT ride my bike. plus, with this elevation here, even with the gondala lifts, there's no way i'd get through all the stages on foot AND i'm riding them tomorrow anyway. I've moved my cleats and am going to try to race with a spare pair of google Nelson brought, and I wanted to test these things out.

I headed to a small bike park that had a nice long flowy jump line with lots of berms. solid 180 degree turns into steep dips - really fun g-force action. the biggest set of tables on the run were just a smidge smaller than the ones on lower dominion. And the berms were smooth as butter - i kinda couldn't believe there were no breaking bumps, only to run into a trail crew diligently smoothing out those pesky breaking bumps - had to cut between the trees to get around them each lap, but totally appreciated the conditions.

at the very top and the bottom 1/4 of the trail was like this pebbly, rubble -gravel-sand like dirt. Really slippery. I didn't ride for too long, as tomorrow is going to be a big day, but everything felt great and it was good to get a little more focused practice in.

The drive to and from this park was a route up and over a peak and man was that an insane road. There are dozens and dozens of cyclists grinding painfully up the climb (or barreling down it) the road is super narrow, cars and busses are trying to pass one another, motorcycles are zipping past absolutely everyone - it's a steep drop on one side and a wall of rock on the other, and it just winds back and forth, hairpin turn after hairpin turn. When a bus was coming the opposite way, we had to come to an almost complete stop and inch past one another. and then there's the view... which just cannot be explained, but it's hard NOT to look at in awe when really one should only be paying attention to the road. (and.... - the hairpins are all numbered - just like in the wahoo mountain routes - lolol.) There was a restaurant at the top that was absolutely packed.

I stopped at the grocery store on my way to the bike park to grab a few toiletries, and i helpfully informed another foreigner that he must weigh his bananas upstairs before brining them to the cashier - of which he was greatly thankful. did i mention I got yelled at by the cashier yesterday when i stopped at this same store to buy bananas (the upstairs floor is all fresh produce, meats & dairy and the downstairs is the non-perishable goods) i mean, she was speaking in Italian, so she could have been loudly praising my good looks, but the stomping off made me think otherwise. and I"ll have you know that today when i walked through, i LOOKED for a scale or what not but still did not see where one would weigh their bananas.

Got a little work done before dinner. emphasis on the little. internet is not awesome - passable but i'm having the toughest time uploading large zip files for website migrations. That cute German couple that sits at the next table during dinner that I've been chatting with said they're going to come cheer me on at the race. :) how adorable is that?
 

muddybike

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
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muddybike

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
pre rode stages 2-5 today. I got to the venue pretty early today, because italians don't give two f's about signs. seriously. I think a total of 2 signs today directing riders on where to go. It's also hard to judge how long a transfer will take when you have no clue how long the gondola rides are - needless to say i had PLENTY of time and did a bit of waiting to drop into the first stage, but I also caught up with some of the women I rode with in Tweed Valley, so it was all good.

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(top of stage 2)

Stage 2 was a shorter stage. the top starts out with s turns through some real marbley gravel - they try to route us onto the grass a bit to help mitigate that but its sketchy as F - and super unassuming looking - I of course immediately washed out my front wheel - granted, i think that was more due to the fact that i moved my cleat position back, and my front wheel wasn't weighted. Lesson learned. There a little punchy up over a rough looking boulder that reminded me of home - there's not a lot of rocks which is kinda surprising - but there are plenty of roots. OMG are there roots. The rest of the stage wound back and forth down a steep grade in the woods with very slippery roots - considering conditions were dry - they were strangely damp.

I met the other American masters woman from MA at the bottom of the stage. then i hit up what i thought was a bike shop for a co2 - which i like to carry during a race and haven't procured yet - but the nearby bike shop didn't carry any. weird.

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I headed up to stage 3 with some of the other women. the gondolas are quite fast if there's no line. you can pile like 20+ bikes in. The officials were being super strict about our start time and made us wait and hour and a half up there. by that time the amount of racers ready to drop was huge, so the other women I was hanging with & I decided to head over to stage 4 (which had the same time-slot for training as 3 for us) and then we could take a gondola back up to 3. So we roll not quite halfway down the mountain (that will be the transfer climb i have to do tomorrow between stages 3&4) with like 3 mins before the stage opened, so we were stoked. But the officials decided to allow the ews100 riders extra time to enter the stage, AND WOULDNT" LET US DROP! OMG i thought there was going to be a riot. so we had to WAIT THERE for another 15-20 mins before they would allow us to go.

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The official started giving the late ews100 riders the bad news that they no longer were allowed to do their practice run (apparently the line for the gondola nearest this stage was crazy long because the gondola was a much smaller cabin than the one we took (we had to ride 'across the meadow' on a fun flow trail to get from where we were dropped off to the stage start).

Honestly, who cares if there is a small amount of overlap? I mean the point is to minimize congestion - but making everyone wait and letting the line to build up while NO ONE WAS RIDING THE STAGE was silly.

So stage 4 was also a shorter stage - and quite fun. lots of loam, in the woods w lots of rooty switchbacks. pretty fun.

Then we decided to pedal back to where the larger gondola was to avoid the excessively long line at the one we were "supposed" to take - it's a mostly flat bike path to the next town. The top of stage three is super fun - kind of open. (I'll try to insert phone pics after i post this). almost bike-park-ish. then into the woods for some steep rooty switchbacks - they love those here - couple REALLY tricky sections and some areas seemed 'wet' - the dirt was packing up into the wheels. There are a couple punchy climbs and some traversing pedally sections that give the arms and hands a break (well, at least in practice -- prob wont' feel like a break when I'm trying to sprint these sections). There's also an insanely tight steep switchback right at the end That i could not do without putting my foot down and pivoting the bike, so i'm just going to plan on that.

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(top of stage 3 - there's a couple jumps and ramps mixed in there)

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and that little bit of trail is what we had to ridedown to get from teh gondolat to stage 3 - pretty fun little trail.

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Then we had another 2 & 1/2 hours before stage 5 opened for us, so we grabbed a sandwich and coffee at a cafe before heading back up. we were outside, but i still feel bad for the other patrons - i'm sure we stank up the place.

We were the first group up to stage 5 and you could see a storm rolling in, so they let us drop a little early. The first section is an exposed ridge line that turns into gravelly switchbacks. people were going down left and right, getting tangled in the tape. Then it's a bumpy but a straight shot for a bit before diving into the woods. Same as the other woods trails - lots and lots of roots. lots of steep switchbacks. staying as wide as possible is pretty much the winning line every time. There is one super tight hairpin that has a chicken wire covered steep wooden bridge drop that mentally caught me up. riders were pivoting on their front tire to setup for it and for some reason that direction is my less successful side to do that on - my foot always pops out - i tried it a few times without success - so I don't know, hoping it flows a little better on Sunday.

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top of stage 5 - it's kinda hard to see the riders on the ridge there, but that green hill is blade-shaped and the course runs along it for a bit.

Afterward I rode back to the car and then dropped off some stuff i borrowed at Nelson's. On my way back down the stairs i totally slipped and fell against the wall (which was stucco) and scraped up my arm (because of course i had taken off my elbow pads). lololol, i had almost no issues today on these insane mountains, but the stairs - the stairs got me - what a clutz!

Now i'm back at the hotel, going to try do get some work done and HOPEFULLY my family will arrive this evening. their connecting flight had been cancelled initially but they got a new one - with a much longer stop over - and now they are waiting to board and it has a 1 hour delay so far. hopefully they'll get on and be in Italy soon. they still have to make the drive from venice to here - which is about 2.5 hours - i just hope my husband can stay alert. (and i hope his rental car is still available - he's been trying to contact the office about the flight delays without any luck - phone, email - no one is answering.
 
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muddybike

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
oh, and i forgot to mention the bottom of stage 5 runs through the top part of the town - through narrow cobble streets - really fun - and the race promoters but an awkward double ramp towards the end - and a really weird man-made "rock garden" - i mean, - after what we rode, that man-made feature is just silly - there was one stage, i'll have to go look at the preview videos posted to remind myself which stage, but an actual rock garden section. Prob on stage 3. that stage seemed to have it all. felt right at home barreling through those rocks!

stage 5 finishes right in the main town event area, so that's fun.
 

Ryan.P

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
You've certainly come a long way from crappy hardtale night rides in South mountain lol , so awesome
 

muddybike

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Pro stage was today! I was dragging a bit, as the Family got in just after midnight (flight cancellations and delays!) and the hotel front desk closes at 11, so I stayed up to let them in.

I headed to the venue and my training time slot a bit early, but I had no clue where to go and I’ve learned that Italians idea of signage is much different than mine.

It was a pretty quick, although steep climb- maybe 30mins pedalling up. Stage was an absolute blast. It starts w a couple switchbacks and a long traversing gradual downhill w rock trolls and stumps to dodge, a couple quick hairpins and then into 1 long climb/sprint that got a bit steeper and rootier as it went on- that really gives your heart rate a kick before diving down into loamy steep switchback turns, some rooty sections and some pot holes to manage. Even a little bit of rock garden action at the bottom. I REALLY liked it.

After I met up w my family and they immediately ditched me to go hit a gondola and hike around the top of the mountains- I can’t blame them. So I rolled over to the ews100 start and cheered on Lewis and Nelson.

Some random local Italian reporter interviewed me in the street- which was super cool but I’ve no idea who/what they were from so I’ll prob never see that footage.

I had too many butterflies to eat a proper lunch so it was just bananas and Kate’s bar to get me through. I wasted some time and then headed up for my pro stage start slot.

Off the line was good, I opened it up on the traversing section and came into the second berm really hot, the ground was also way more chewed up with loose rocks and my front wheel washes- i was quick to hop back on and cranked back up to speed. Felt good on the next section and gave a solid sprint push up the climb. Rode very clean and felt smooth and fast until the final straight section that had some rocks/roots and pit holes to manage and I had the wrong gear to get over a large hump, almost stalled but threw my weight into the pedals and got over without dabbing and then I stomped to get back up to speed through the rest of that section and sprint out into the grassy field finish.

Really happy with that effort. Feeling much more like myself and extreamly happy to put an actual race effort into the stage. (things hadn’t clicked back into place since my acl repair until today)

Landed smack in the middle- 4th of 7 in my field. Beyond stoked. Had some serious imposter syndrome in Scotland, so incredibly happy to prove that negative voice wrong.

Now we hope there’s no rain tonight and the blue skies continue for stages 2-5. And really, just going to approach it with the same attitude as today and have fun as fast as I can.
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serviceguy

Well-Known Member
Your journal really makes me want to go visit Italy now!

I actually hated Canazei for a long time due to a bad experience involving an ex girlfriend, a surprise overnight trip and a middle age ski instructor going above and beyond to please the customer. Guess who got the biggest surprise…

Give them hell!
 
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muddybike

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Your journal really makes me want to go visit Italy now!

I actually hated Canazei for a long time due to a bad experience involving an ex girlfriend, a surprise overnight trip and a middle age ski instructor going above and beyond to please the customer. Guess who got the biggest surprise…

Give them hell!
Wow, that sounds like quite a story! Glad to be inspiring some love for this area- it is pretty incredible here!
 
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