Black Rock Flow Cup Downhill Race #2

Yesterday I took Brison up to Black Rock for the second in the series of Flow Cup Downhill races. And he did great! As he always does...

We arrived there at just a little past 9 in the morning and didn't get out of there until almost 6 o'clock in the evening. It made for a long day. I think the guys that put this series on have a very "Fluid" sense of time. But I will say that they didn't seem to make the same mistakes as they did last race. These were a whole new batch. The way I see it, that's progress. It's when someone beats there head against the wall again and again expecting different results. That's when I get really frustrated.

But the fact that we got there early let Brison get a couple practice runs in. Which was a good thing, because they changed the course slightly.  So he hopped on the first shuttle up the mountain after signing in. Which Aaron (My friend who I bamboozled into coming too.) and myself  did as well. I wanted to see the changes and get an idea of the route they were going to take.

As a side note. The shuttle drivers are crazy! They were bombing up and down that logging road like their hair was on fire. I was towards the back of the truck and was getting bucked around like I was in a rodeo or something (I left my ass less chaps at home.).

Once we got to the top all the riders were shuffling there way to the starting ramp to take their turn.

The ramp rolls you straight into a pretty gnarly rock garden with in about ten feet. And not little rocks either. nice fat shin and ankle bitters. I can see why a lot of guys said that was one of the toughest parts. As Aaron and I walked down the hill I was amazed by some of the other trails and stunts around there. A couple of the larger gap jumps made we want to pee a little... I don't know how the riders do it.

I guess it's true what they say, "Take your brain out. Put your helmet on and bomb that way, really fast."

Here's B at the top of the ramp~

And here is part of the rock garden I was talking about~

The photo doesn't do it justice at all. You can only see the beginning of it on the left there. But anyway...

On his second practice run he ended up taking a digger after the road gap right in front of us. I'm not sure if it was just circumstance or if we were distracting him ( I hope it wasn't that.) But he rung his bell pretty good. And as Brison was sitting on the ground dazed another rider came with in a few inches of nailing him. I'm sure that would have hurt a lot more than the actual wreck. But I ran down, he got up and sat on a near by picnic table for a couple of minutes. In the mean time I checked his bike. It was fine and after a bit he was too.

After that episode we went down to the bottom to talk to Tracy for a while. He was catering this shindig. And once lunch rolled around I sweet talked him into a hamburger in trade for a future Guinness (Thanks Tracy!)



The dog's name doing a little "Hoovering" was Zeus. He was very interested in the bacon.

 Once the shuttle headed up the mountain for the first timed run Aaron and I went back up to get a good view at the road gap.

Brison flew by with little problem this time. He looked good, fast and smooth. Although I must admit not really knowing what I'm looking at can be hard sometimes.  I saw a couple guy's fly by at what looked like break-neck speed and their times didn't really reflect that at all. While others swooped on by with little muss or fuss and absolutely killed it time wise. Go figure...




Brison and Aaron hanging around (There was a lot of that.).


We walked back down to the shuttle area to see how Brison's first run went and to hangout while everyone else finished up their first runs. And then we waited, and waited, and waited some more for the second timed run to start.

I guess one of the drivers left without telling the right person so the other shuttle driver had to make a special trip back down for the stragglers. Who of course were some of the guys that were suppose to go off first. Seems like everyone involved could use a lesson in communication. But I digress...

We hungout at the finish line and talked with the guy in charge. It was interesting to see how the timing system was set up. And how they went about sending people off from the top.

Once Brison had completed his second run I was excited to see how he had done.




Its hard to see, but he ended up cutting 16 seconds off his time between the two runs!  That's pretty substantial. His best was 5 minutes, 17 seconds. Good enough for third in Category 2 juniors (After the last race he moved up a category).

He was pretty happy with that. And I must say I was as pleased as punch. He did great!



Great job Brison!

 
Tomorrow I'll try to get the video up. It takes more computer horsepower than I have at my disposal. Until then...

Rubber side down,

Big E

PS~ I'll be turning the pedals in anger here tonight for the second time at the Twilight Crit Series down in Eugene. I've got a couple teammates going with me.  I'll let you know how it goes!