I Have Been Called The Singing bird of my Generation

Canada Cups P1

Yoyoyo!

I have another update for yall. This puppy is going to be lacking humour as my current attitude is lacking pizzaz. I just finished the Hardwood Hills Canada Cup and am a hurtin unit...

Back from Europe in Edmonton I was greeted to snow. Dressed warm and tried to put in my first real week of training since early March. Did a bunch of snowy 4 hour cross rides and some 5 hour ERTC road marches. I also received my super deluxe Cannondale Flash Carbon 1. Unreal bike! Also waiting for me at Revo was a pair of Easton EC90SLX Tubular wheels. SICK! Can’t wait to glue some rubber and shred some gnarly pavement races. Thanks OGC!!!

From there I organized my 2.5 week Canada Cup extravaganza. First up was Baie Saint Paul (aka BSP, 1 hour downstream from Quebec City) my traveling partner this year was the pride of Nova Scotia, young superstar Andrew L’Esperance. We were rolling in style in his mom’s TDI Jetta and were fueled my a Halifax Costco run (thanks Andrews Mom!). Andrew interrupted my picnic at the Quebec City Airport and from there our journey began.

Once in BSP we kicked a grocery run with our Norco roommates and settled into a fully equipped farmhouse. Myself and Lespy shared a room and bed as the air mattress only held air for about 2 hours. Helping the sleeping situation was a thick blanket barrier which was for the most part mutually respected. The BSP course was a really wicked 5.5km loop. Crazy rocky and bumpy. Could have raced a 140mm bike no problem. This season I get the luxury of a second row start which I am going to try and make good use of in the next paragraph...

BSP Dirt Race:

Settled into a top 15 posish for the first lap and realized I was getting shredded on the bumpy decents with my hardtail (also my 3 hour total ride time on the new bike wasn’t helping). Climbing wize I was gapping everyone around me by a grip, but I was losing HUGE chunks on the downhills and ended up not trying as hard as I would like due to frustration. Ended up somewhere in the low 20’s at the finish and 4th espoir. Lespy also had a hard time with the bumps and motivation and was in the 30’s. We both vowed revenge in Tremblant.

To vent our frustrations we crushed a 2 hours internet session at the venue and the race organized gave us some beers to enjoy (nice guy). From there we packed up the Wagon and shook and baked our way to Mont Tremblant. Settled into a condo in a unreal location. Walking distance from the start line with a cold creek running through our yard. Ice baths were had daily. I spend one of the evenings hanging out with Benoit at his pad and he helped me with my bike fit and we hit up some local trails and a midweek xc race.

After dialing in the Tremblant course with hot laps and video surveillance early in the week we were able to sit back and fully recover before race day...

Canada Cup update Part 2 coming shortly.





CC