A while back, I asked for some tips on spending a day at Whistler MTB bike
park while we were on holiday in BC and Alberta. Thought I'd take a few
minutes to write a note about how it went, and to thank the guys who offered
advice. It all came in very useful.
Well, we (the girlfriend and I) turned arrived in Whistler middle of the
afternoon. Girlfried took one look at the mental antics going on at the bike
park and declared she'd definately be finding her own entertainment for the
next day! First impressions when we walked out of the hotel into the village
was: 'this is heaven'. Like-minded bikers all over the place, cool bikes
and lots of bike shops. I couldn't help feeling like some sort of weird
pervert, drooling over bikes and gear. Managed to spend a small fortune
stocking up on end-of-season discounted gear. Then wandered over to the
Blackcomb vistors centre and sorted myself out with a lift pass, bike hire
and 3-hour guided tour for the next day. The thought of finally getting to
ride the most revered park in the world was a mouthwatering one.
Awoke nice and early the next day, excited and a little bit nervous. Got
myself all padded up, much to the girlfriends delight when she discovered
she could kick my shins and punch my arms as hard as she could without it
hurting me at all. Mental note made that these could come in handy at a
later date...
Arrived at the bike hire place and waited 30 mins to be kitted out with a
Kona Stinky Deelux. Solid looking bike, I was immediately glad I'd be
getting the chairlift up and not riding that beast up hill all day! Our
guide was a really cool guy, with skill and patience in abundance. Two other
folks would be joining us - a guy from Minnesota and a gal from Seattle.
Very friendly people - even if they couldn't understand a word of my
Scottish accent.
Our guide took us over some of the basics - stuff I already knew and put
into practice on my XC bike, but found that putting into practice on a DH
bike was a different story. The lack of SPDs really threw me when trying to
do hops and pre-jumps.
We then started off on B-line, which was very do-able. Then went onto some
more tricky lines like Ho Chi Mhin (sp?), Joy Ride and heart of Darkness. I
found these to be right at my level of ability. I only bottled it one one
section - a section that I knew I could ride on my XC bike. It was a
relatively steep, long, straight section with quite a few mini-bombholes on
it. But for some reason, I stalled, even though I knew it was easily
do-able. I thought about attacking it again, but my bottle had totally
dropped, so I tried to walk it. And what a mistake that was. Got about a
third of the way down before realising the ground was so compacted it was
like a skating rink. proceded to fall on my [censored], then tumbled down, with
the bike following just behind me. As I got to the bottom, the guide
suggested with a wry smile that it might have been easiler to just ride it.
I could only agree.
Our female co-rider didn't last much longer unfortunately. On one of the
runs, I and the other guy bombed on ahead, and the guide held back to check
the girl was getting on ok. It seems she then had a major disagreement with
a boulder, which threw her over the bars and left her dazed and badly
bruised. She managed to walk off the mountian and called it a day. Five
minutes later, we were to see more carnage - one guy sliced his hand open
while doing a jump. As soon as he had been patched up, and the jump
re-opened, another guy landed upside down, with the bike riding him. Looked
really nasty, but he hobbled away after ten minutes.
Once the guide had gone home, I done another 4 runs on B-line to get some
confidence up. Two things became immediately obvious to me - DHr's are not
as lazy as I once thought they were - it takes some real strength and
stamina to get those bikes up to any sort of speed, and DHilling is just as
hard on the arms as it is on the legs. By 3pm, after 5 hours on the
mountain, my entire body was shaking like I had the DTs. And so I called it
a day.
Overall, it was an excellent day, and I'd love to do it again. I'm going to
sort myself out with a DH bike as soon as the bank manager will allow, but I
fear that UK downhills will be a bit soft compared to Whistler. Still,
better than not riding at all.
Thanks again to the guys for help!
Kevin