Rim Nordic #2
by Rob Blue on July 16th, 2007
Racing up at Rim Nordic this past Sunday was eye opening. I have heard about their summer series for years but never got around to racing up there. It turns out that was a big mistake. The Rim Nordic series should be on every Southern California racers list.
The course itself was one of the best I have been lucky enough to ride. I think it ranks right up there with the Northstar at Tahoe races. Almost entirely made up of singletrack with plenty of variety to really test your skills and well as your fitness. Sunday’s race featured a series a three singletrack climbs connected by some nice rolling singletrack, complete with a bunch of wooden bridges, before hitting a short section of fireroad at the top that led to some sweet downhill singletrack. The theme here is singletrack and lots of it.
My day started out bright and early. I really enjoyed the fact that Rim Nordic is a bit closer to me than Big Bear. The time saved from the shorter drive sure is nice when you are doing a day trip. I wish I had the time to do the race weekends like I used to. It sure was nice to drive out on a Friday, pre-ride the course, hang out Friday night having a beer or two then find some cool place to ride for Saturday (or pre-ride again). That is pretty much a thing of the past for me nowadays. I just have too many other responsibilities.
Parking for the race is mostly accross the street in the Snow Valley lot. This is really nice because they have the restrooms open for the racers and they even allow camping. I immediately ran in to two beautiful girls from the Velo Bum team. They parked their car right next to me because they saw my Turner Nitrous. They had a pair of matching Nitrous bikes on their roof rack. Turns out it was Danae and Deidre York and their mom. These girls are awesome. I would love to get them involved with Evomo.
I found this photo online of Danae racing her Turner Nitrous:
I ran into a bunch of people I know including Dave Sheek and Scott Lelieur. Dave is a fellow Evomo sponsored rider. Dave gave me the run down of the course since I did not get to pre-ride. He also got a podium spot for his race. Scott and I have raced against each other since we were beginners. It was nice to hear that Scott battles the same time crunches that I do. It’s always cool seeing the guys at the races.
This brings up my first lesson of the weekend, pre-riding a course is a big asset. This is an obvious point if you have never ridden a particular course before. Such is the case with me never having been to Rim Nordic before. Had I pre-ridden the course I would have been a lot faster and finished the race.
What? “and finished the race”? Yep, I have notched up another DNF for my season. The race started pretty good. My category had 25 guys and we all pretty much stayed together for the first climb. Then my lack of knowledge of the course slowed me down as we snaked through some cool singletrack. The trail was not too technical but it was loose in spots and I lost the front and crashed into a rock. No serious injuries and the bike was fine so I got back up and chased on to the back.
After the second climb I had another spill in a flat hairpin turn that was really sandy. Again, I lost the front but jumped right back up and continued racing. Being able to bounce back up is a part of the sport that you learn early on.
The third climb was tough. The grade was pretty steep in places with quite a few switchbacks. It was loose and the combination of all of these factors created a bit of walking traffic in spots. I probably could have ridden it clean but some of the lines were taken up by walkers 6 guys deep. That’s just another part of racing. I have heard that in the European World Cup races there are so many guys that there are back ups at places where a fireroad merges down to singletrack that the racers actually stand in line for minutes to access the trail. So traffic happens even in the best races in the world, stop bitching and deal with it 
I made it past the climbing and recovered a bit on the fireroad section up top. Then the really fun stuff began. The downhill singletrack was amazing. From fast flowing to huge pucker factor switchbacks there was something for everyone. I was having a lot of fun and really looking forward to the next lap so I could do it again. I then hit a root of some kind that instantly flatted my front tire and caused my third and final crash of the day.
There was no fixing my front tire, it was done. Huge disappointment for me. I was feeling pretty good and having fun. The insult to injury was having to walk down even more cool stuff to get back to the finish line. It sure would have been a lot more fun to ride that stuff. Oh well, my theme of “that’s racing” continues. That was a long walk back. I got a huge blister on my toe as well to bum me out even more. MTB shoes are not made for long hikes.
I got a lot of encouragement from my fellow racers and the great staff at Rim Nordic. I am looking forward to doing it again next month. I left a little bruised in both mind and body but I’ll have a much better race next time.
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sucks on the flat tire… sounds like a fun course though. probably not much room for passing being mostly single track?
No room for passing? That’s when you just got to get crazy and tear out a side wall through the brush.
Like Clint says, there’s always room for passing you just have to be creative (and a bit crazy). You do have to gamble with you tirs a bit. That’s where running tubeless with some Stan’s sealant give you an advantage. It won’t save a sidewall (like mine) but it will take on quite a few thorns or cactus barbs.
I love Stan’s. Here in AZ it is a must, I have pulled tires off after a couple months and found them chucked full of cactus. It doesn’t even matter out here if you get crazy or not, punctures are an inevitability.
The tires for Rim Nordic are Kenda Kozmic Lites, 2.0 with a scoop of Stans love juice!
That course is hard nothing and technical for a race course with lots of exposed junk. If your lines aren’t smooth it hurts…
They had lots of crashes this weekend including a broken collarbone, OUCH!
[...] I had nothing but trouble at Rim Nordic #2 but really liked the course and the overall vibe of the race. I was convinced that the rest of the guys would have a great time if we hit it together with our only goal being to have a lot of fun. I eventually got Bryan, Bruce and Greg on board but Mikel is on some sort of secret spy mission and we are still waiting on the last few parts for Brandon’s new Nitrous. Someone really needs to steal Brandon’s old bike and the curse that goes along with it. Bad juju. [...]