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Wrenchin' in the USA: The Chris Davidson diary 2007
Chris joins us again in 2007 to report on life on the road turning the wrench for a variety of teams both in dirt and on the road. Formerly with Ford Cycling in 2006, Chris has also worked for such teams as T-Mobile, Equipe Nurnberger, Quark and Mercury in the past, as well as neutral support programs with Shimano, Pedros and Trek.
As 2007 holds some new challenges for Chris, some things will stay the same. One of those will be his informative diary contributions on Cyclingnews, where you'll often receive the inside scoop on all things tech and a look at life behind the wrench.
August 16, 2007
Season celebrations
Greetings Cyclingnews.com readers,
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My weekend was spent at Snowmass in Aspen, Colorado, a beautiful mountainous setting for the last stop on the NMBS tour for 2007. Aspen is a great venue for mountain biking, there are already a great network of trails in the area that offer epic singletrack and challenging descents, oh, and lung busting climbs up to 11,000ft.
Summer is a busy time in Snowmass, they are quickly trying to finish building about a million more condos on the mountain for this coming ski season, so there was construction everywhere. The start/finish this year was moved to a new area, Two Creeks, and this necessitated and lollypop-type course. Problem here being that the racing was not that spectator friendly. This was a topic of conservation for the weekend, as it appears that this year attendance is shrinking at the NMBS series races, and course selection was a prominent target.
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World Cups typically use a smaller loop and more laps than the NMBS races, and while cramming 240 racers on an eight kilometre loop comes off as a clusterf***, perhaps something can be learned from having a more accessible course for viewing. The sport needs to evolve and the marketing potential for big time mountain bike racing is huge. Finding the right mix is a slow process, but I hope that the NMBS is willing to change for the better. We will all benefit.
Enough of the waxing poetic, back to the event. I would have to say that being late in the season and being at super high altitude, motivation was taxed at the races. Most riders were trying to consolidate season-long standings and put a positive spin on the end of the year.
The travel for the recent events has been taxing as well. Given this, the big focus for most athletes and staff was getting through the weekend with enough energy to attend that end of the season party on Sunday night. I was amazed at the pre-party buzz that abounded. The Trek and Fisher teams combined to host the Sunday night blowout in the Snowmass village, and it was themed and '80s party. Many an athlete spent some serious time contemplating the outfit necessary for this party, as I heard discussion of the clothing choices back at the Vermont and North Carolina races.
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Fast forward to Sunday night: a bunch of really spent racers and staff dressed in painfully dated clothes looking for a good time. Things got out of hand in a hurry. I hope that the pictures do a better job defining what happened than my words. The end result was a lot of skinny, ill-tanned people getting really silly in celebration of months of religious diet, exercise, travel and suffering. So one night a year is not going to do that much damage, right? Check out the pics.
Packing the car to leave I was startled by a 600+ lbs brown bear lumbering through the parking lot. Scared me good, but then again, it was probably here in Aspen for the same reasons I was; this place is really beautiful.
With this last stop, the mountain biking is done for 2007. I am off to a couple of road events to cap the year, US Pro Road Championships and the Tour of Missouri. Then on to Vegas and the annual Interbike trade show. 2008 is not that far away.
There is still work to be done…
Chris Davidson
Photography
For a thumbnail gallery of these images, click here
Images by Chris Davidson
- The dancing on the bar started early. Can you name the participants?
- Willow Koerber (Subaru/Gary Fisher) sizzles in a white outfit.
- Adam Craig (Giant) fully busted.
- Willow Koerber (Subaru/Gary Fisher) lights the place ablaze.
- An unnamed mass of riders, staff and a reporter or two.
- Thankfully Naked Man kept his clothes on.
- Heather Irminger (Subaru/Gary Fisher) also lights up the night in white.
- Jeremy Horgan-Kobelski (Subaru/Gary Fisher) rocking a sweet headband and farmer tan.
- Sam Shultz (Subaru/Gary Fisher) rocks the all-white kit as well.
- Now we are talking…
- Ahh, bad clothing call there.
- Kenda/X-Fusion/Titus teammates Sarah Barber and Heather Homes get their swerve on.
- Vella Bella team management just killing it.
