Day 6.... and they call it "Test of Metal"

We spent our day on trails around Squamish, and the trials are not for the squeamish. By way of comparison, they more technical that pretty much anything at Fortune, or like Kanata Lakes, but make the whole loop all downhill at 30 degrees.

Some horrendous climbs at the beginning, like "Bonk Hill", gaining. 700 m before plunging back into the valley on crazy steep and rocky single track. Amazingly only a few bad injuries so far. Other than the 15 cases of heat stroke (which in fact is a low amount considering 500 riders is terrible heat), there was 1 concussion, 3 separated shoulders, 1 separated elbow, 1 broken wrist i.e. 6 hard injuries. We figure there is about 15000 rider hours in this race, giving a rate of injury of 1 every 2500 hours. Of course this is for experienced riders, but tired riders too. It seems really very supportive data to the assertion that mountain biking is super safe. Imagine the injury rate with a bunch of triathletes doing 7 Olympic Tris in a row ? :)

Stuart thought Trevor would be another addition to the injury list as he came over a rise to see Trevor off over the handles bars and off the trail with his bike on top of him. The video guy happened to catch it all on film ....will be appearing in a theatre near you. With just a little whining, he was on his bike again and we both finished the day solidly in 16/46, holding our spot. After we finished, it "turns" out (if you'll excuse the pun) that Trevors rear rotor was seriously warped, meaning bad brake rub, stealing a gear or two of power. Trevor noticed his climbing went downhill on the "Bonk Hill" uphill (again excusing the puns), so we figure the disk took a hit on the just prior single track.

Trevor's friend Alain aka Wally from Ottawa (presently working in Vancouver), and his family met us at dinner. A complete surprise to see some familiar faces. Hopefully, we will see them at the finish line tomorrow.
As you can see by the photo he is a little confused about where the Inflatables are placed relative to Team Winded. "What's with that?"

The team we made 17 mins on yesterday was a minute ahead today. Mike Livingston lives an Morocco and will be moving to China next month. A reminder to exchange emails and arrange a visit when Stuart and Heather visit there hopefully next year. It is really nice having a friendly rivalry with - we have been calling them "our nemesis", and with the luxury of them being ahead of us, they have been calling "us annoying" well Trevor anyway :)

Day 7 promises some very famous single track, and at 45km not too punishing ... hopefully!

Cheers,
Stuart and Trevor.