All kinds of bike riding and racing are great, which is why I’ve never ruled anything out. When my sweet boyfriend took note of this women’s camp posted on the ridemonkey forum, on the same date as the Single Speed World Championship race in Ireland which I could no longer afford to attend, I was intrigued.
Photograph by Mark Poore
The CAMP Curriculum: Being a professional mountain bike coach, I value curriculum a great deal and made a point to check in with promoters that there would be challenge for all skill levels. I was looking for advanced skills practice, along the lines of tailwhips, and big drops. I considered my ambitions fair, because I had been riding and racing cross country, dh and super D in addition to other non-mtb events like adventure racing and triathlon. I knew the basics in bike-handling well enough to teach others but was not afraid to humble myself and admit that there’s always more to learn. Still, when given the option to choose which group I wanted to ride with, I chose advanced.
Angie’s a certified International MountainBike Instructor Certification coach, which landed on my coaching radar a couple years ago as something potentially useful to compliment my USA Cycling Coach certification. I was glad to meet a handful of people with some experience from IMIC, and just sat back and took it all in. I liked the coaching style performed by Angie, who seems naturally to be a good listener and enthusiastic about sharing skills. There were also a handful of skills demonstrations which seemed to fit into a more formal program, that I would anticipate the other groups also shared. I really liked the practicality of some of the practice skill sessions (manual, bunny hop, and drops/jumps), although it seemed time-consuming at the time to watch everyone and wait my turn. I learned more in watching and listening than in doing and talking, although I don’t think one can exist without the other. In the end, I learned some things I didn’t know that I didn’t know.
The Bike Park: Finally, the organizers of the event put together such a great package deal, that it couldn’t be passed up. $109 for 2 days of dh bike and armor rentals, lift tickets, accommodations AND lunch! Snowshoe offers a majority of advanced trails on both sides of the mountain, with lots of rocks and drops alternating between man-made and natural features. Trails that gave some challenge to my head were on the Western side with Ninja Bob, Missing Link, Ball & Jack and Pro DH. Trails were designed and maintained beautifully, especially when it was possible to place singletrack right off of the lift. What we didn’t plan for was the extra bonus of Go Pro HD footage recorded to help us review our techniques – this was priceless!
Photograph by Justin Scheifflee
Equipment: The 2011 Kona (A blue, size small, Kona Operator Freeride) DH bike had Boxxer’s 8 inches of full-suspension travel, Minion tires, and sram x9 shifting, so I felt right at home in no time. The bike’s wheelbase felt manageable – even flickable – despite being close to 40 pounds. It took some getting used to the super-slack headtube angle (64deg) since I’ve only ridden my Banshee Pyre (all mountain mtb w/68deg HTA) on DH trails before. As it turns out they will be selling it with the rest of this years’ demo fleet, soon. If you call Snowshoe’s Mountain Adventure Center, be sure to ask Ethan about the demo fleet sale and then give one a try.
