NSMB AIRprentice Day 3 Recap

9:28am,

Skye Schillhammer, Kyle Quesnel, Paris Gore and myself have just returned from our early morning photo shoot, all of us drinking black coffee. Not by choice, someone had put the milk, cream and cream cheese into a freezer rather than fridge. Thankfully Silverstar village has Buggaboos and Isadores to supply riders with food, and specialty coffees to keep the team running smoothly.

Kyle and Skye had their blog’s finished and were in the process of sending them in to Trevor and Cam to make the 9:30am deadline; while I was sitting in front of my computer yelling at wordpress to upload my pictures faster, 2 minutes and 10 more photo’s to upload. It was time to accept the fact that this was one deadline I was not going to make. I read over my words once again looking for spelling and grammar mistakes, missing more than acceptable amount I’m sure. Trevor then enters the restaurant of the Silverlode where we were eating and tells us “we are meeting for another group photo in the village”. Skye and Kyle were happy to go having sent their blogs in, this photo was going to hurt my entry time. We all grabbed our downhill bikes and headed to the Silverstar sign in the front of the village. After our group photo, Trevor and Cam explained the plan for the day. Now till 11:30 was course training, with an 11:30 start. We were then set loose, I ran back to the Silverlode resturant were my pictures had finally finished loading. I threw my blog together and emailed it to Cam & Trevor. Then left on my Norco Aline provided by Double Diamond Service Shop on Silverstar. But, before heading to the lift I stopped into the Lord Aberdeen Market for a healthy breakfast of a cliff bar and a Rockstar. After a scary ride down Comet Trail, I was on the Comet Chair and flying to the top of the mountain eating my breakfast. I was feeling very confident with my line down Dag’s, my training plan consisted of a mellow first run, followed by a serious “race practice” run. I off loaded the chair, thanked the bike park lift attendant as I grabbed my bike and headed down the ramp to Dag’s. I stopped my bike at the trail head and counted a “3…2…1…go!” In my head. I cleaned the first rock section and headed out onto the open ski run under the chair lift. I cranked down on my left pedal, only to fling myself forward. I looked down and my chain had broken, “no big deal” I thought, “I’ll just coast a run down”. I dropped into the next section of Dag’s under paradise road, dropped the first rock section and popped my tire. After, a long and frustrating hike back to the top of the lift. I bought a 2$ tube from the lift attendants, changed my tire and luckily met up with Cam who had his Lezyne multi tool with him allowing me to fix my chain as well.  I rolled back to Dag’s trailhead and counted a second “3…2…1…go!” and rolled into Dag’s feeling the constraint of time and I decided to “race practice” this run. I came out of the bottom of Dag’s with a smile on my face I had stuck all my lines and I felt on point. A second terrifying ride down Comet Trail, back on the Comet chair and another “thank you” up top as I get my bike from the lift attendant. I took another run down Dag’s and repeated the Comet run routine and it was time for the pre-race meeting where I was informed due to my number I would be dropping first. After a short peep talk by the NSMB team members, I grabbed my helmet and lined up on the “starting root” (we had all decided this root would be the start location so you could get a pedal in before the time marker.) The radio call was made “Rider 00 dropping in 3…2…1…” I tagged the timing mechanism with my arm and I was off.

First run lower section of Dag’s, I have alot of respect for photographer Paris Gore after this weekend. I see big things and cover shots for him.

Coming out of the trees at the bottom I pedaled my heart out across the finish line. One thing I had forgotten about downhill racing is that point when you cross the finish line finally slow your bike to a stop, almost fall off it, tear off your full face helmet and gasp for air. Your lungs and throat burning, but the burning feels good, especially after that run in particular. I had hit all my lines, rolled every rock as perfectly as I could and given it my all. Skye was next across the line followed by a chainless Ollie Jones. After regrouping we were sent back to the top, the classic scary Comet run to Comet chair once again.

Half way up the chair, we were coming upon the section of trail were Dag’s crosses the chair lift line.  We were confused as to why we had not seen any riders cross under the chair. Matt Montandon was marshalling the World Cup / Dag’s intersection. As the chair crept forward more of the event going on underneath us began to unfold. As the trees crept away, it became clear that Matt was lying on the ground having his C-spine held by one of Silverstar’s patrollers and a sea of concerned green shirts stood around watching. Our eyes were locked on the event as chairlift speculation began. “Was he hit? Did he pass out? Was he ridding?” our eyes were locked as the trees once again covered what was going on below us. We got off the chair and immediately headed to the start gate where little information was available. I asked patroller Phil Gaudette what he knew, Phil knew very little. No one had seen the incident until Brad Mills came upon Matt face down on the ground during his race run. After a full inspection my Silverstars’ world-class patrollers  “Matt is back on his feet and the course is clear” an Australian accent communicated over the radio. No one really knows what happened to Matt, all we know is that his face ain’t so pretty no more!

“Get your helmet on Doug, let’s go!” Trevor yelled at me. Caught off guard I grabbed my helmet and bike lined up on the start root and rolled in for my second run. My second run didn’t go as good, foot planted my injured foot up top and missed a tight line in the lower section causing me to fall off race line costing me a few second.

Second run just before getting thrown into some loam on the side of the trail

Skye followed me once again and after some long discussion and a couple “I can’t believe it’s over’s”, We decided to go do a run of Pipedream. Skye and myself have a long-standing argument regarding “whether Pipedream or Dirt Merchant is the better trail.” I haven’t ridden Dirt Merchant but, Pipedream has a sort of McHammer “Can’t Touch This” thing going on in my mind. After a run down upper pipedream we headed in to the Saloon for lunch and awards. Lunch once again was delicious, but different. For lunch, we received a chicken burger, beer and a salad, salad? Skye and myself questioned this decision and immediately ordered a basket of waffle fries! The bikes had already been brought in and the NSMB team had kicked us all away from the prizing table and they began their deliberation. After 20 minutes all the competitors were fed, hydrated and happy; we were then brought over to the main stage of the Saloon were the prizes for the weekend were given away. Ben Friesen scored a futuristic looking combo of a new Urge helmet and Adidas goggles for his banger line down Prostar. Spencer Graf got the Fish Out of Water award for his big bike performance in the vault. Kyle Quesnel winning best a.m banger/photo, John Rempel won the Tough Guy award for riding with a separated shoulder, I got the Nice Guy/always wants to help out award and got a sweet pair of Adidas sunglasses and pair of scissors, which I genuinely believed were for my jeans. Thank fully Ollie Jones won Biggest Hucker/Loosest Rider if I remember correctly and thankfully got a new Maxxis Minnion Tire for his bike and a set of Sram grips, since he was essentially riding bare bars all weekend.

Then it was on to the serious stuff, first the downhill results, I came in 3^rd, Ollie Jones in 2^nd, and Stephen Matthews in the top spot. Next, the top 5 riders who would move on to the interviews, it was composed of Ollie Jones, Bard Mills, Skye Schillhammer, Stephen Matthews and myself. The question period began, questions about the weekend, best rider/most impressive, favorite run, favorite rider, where do you see your self in 5 years, why? But, I feel Stephen won with his answer to the question “if Specialized was a girl where would you take her?” to which he answered “the Calgary Stampede” Stephen is truly a Calagrian.

After the question period the team deliberated for the last time, upon there return Matt was chosen to reveal the winner and Stephen Matthews took it. Stephen seemed amped and I think he is going to produce some good content for NSMB.com and he is a solid addition to the team.

After the announcement Dan from Nokia started giving out the cell phones, I was lucky enough to get first pick and a new Nokia E7. The Nokia E7 looks super sick with a 4” touch screen, 8mp camera, WiFi, 3G, Bluetooth 3.0, 16GB storage space and a full multi media center including Dolby digital music and a HDMI connection for video. Soon after the phones were handed out, the hand shakes and high fives started to be distributed as riders filtered out of the Saloon.

This has been the funnest weekend I have ever had riding my bike. You get meet riders who have the same goals as you and are riding at the same caliber that you are and everyone is just out having fun and riding. Mixed with world-class photographers that want to capture the action as bad as you want to throw it down. I can’t wait for the road trips to start and the facebook discussions to get going. I know I’ll be seeing all these riders in future whether it be, online, in competition, in the village, clapping for them since they just stomped a massive trick or in front of me as I chase them down the next trail we head down together. I had an amazing time at AIRprentice and I’m stoked to continue riding with new people.

Huge thank you once again to,

Family

NSMB.com for having me

Double Diamond Service Shop

Silverstar Resort for the amazing trails, food and bottomless jugs of beer

Remember to thank your bike lift attendants!

CoC Compound

Driving up to Blackcomb lot 2 I’m feeling like the luckiest man on the mountain. Because I have a pass to ride the CoC Compound. Upon arrival at the compound I began unpacking my bike from the bag I had packed it in to get on the plane.  The CoC Compound is really impressive appealing to all types of campers, mountain bikers, snowboarders and skateboarders. The Compound jump line is slightly intimidating at first, you roll in off 10 foot tall scafold into a 8 foot wood to wood gap jump followed by a long and low then the mulch jump. The long and low scared me at first since its wood to wood but, once you get the speed right it’s super coasty. The Airbag sits to the right of the jump line with a 5 or so foot tall wood lip.

Soon after finishing my bike and while I was in the process of tightening my bolts, CoC big wig Gord Calder showed up and asked for some help removing supplies from his truck.  While Gord and myself were unpacking the supplies, he explain he was “making flag holders for the CoC flags on the glacier”.He showed me the flags and told me “if I built the flag holders for him, he would blow up the Airbag for me”. After two hours of work I was finally ready to start riding. Gord walked over to the Airbag with me and spotted my first run. The Airbag is amazing, what you imagine landing in a cloud would feel like. As I began my first runs into the Airbag I told Gord my goal for the day was to land a flip to dirt. He was immediately stoked and got me super pumped.

The Airbag is the ultimate mountain bike jump/trick training tool. The Airbag allows you to try anything, really anything. You can land any which way and still walk away. But, what the airbag offers you over foam is the fact that you can actually land tricks and ride away! over the course of the afternoon I had the opportunity to try and land numerous tricks to the Airbag, then, you bring it to mulch. And coaches are always around helping you learn tricks faster and get your current tricks more dialed. In a single afternoon, I learnt backflips, almost landed some 720’s. In addition to myself learning new tricks, I saw 4 or 5 other campers stomp backflips to mulch, as well as  the 360’s, no foot cans, and super man’s they has already learnt. Plus, Justin Wyper snap a massive frontflip off a 3 foot lip!, Casey Groves dumping his 3’s so hard he was getting inverted, Wink Grant throwing some steez, Alan Hepburn cork flip his Banshee Legend MK 2. As well as, 3 mulch pit warriors hucking some nutty combo’s.

The CoC Compound is more than an unbelievable mountain biking training ground, there is a miniature 6-10 convenience store, blow up gladiator/sumo wrestling area, bungee long distance running play area, skate board mini ramp, mini skatepark, basketball, ping pong, foosball and lots of other stoked campers to ride with.

If your looking to meet some new people, dial in your tricks, learn new tricks and ride Whistler with professional coaches, head to CoC this summer and get stoked!

Doug

NSMB AIRprentice Day 1/2 Recap

The introduction session was short and sweet, the Bulldog put together some tasty sandwiches and other assorted finger food while the beer was flowing. It was great to finally meet everyone and get the personality behind the pic and video. Soon after everyone arrived the bikes were brought out and jerseys were distributed. The bikes look amazing, Specialized and the other sponsor really steped it up.  The P3 and Demo 8 are both built to the highest possible level, as far as a jersey I chose “00”. After everyone got there number Cam and Trevor introduced themselves and gave a quick speech. It was soon after there speech it became obvious this was not going to be a year of excessive drinking. Within 20 minutes everyone had gone to the dorm rooms and was preparing for bed. Matt Montandon and myself were staying at my home on Silverstar and both of us enjoyed our nice comfy bed, while dreaming about tricks, berms and good times with the crew.

First things first, Saturday morning, a breakfast of bagels, juice, coffee and bananas. Everyone met up in the restaurant of the Silver Lode Hotel to eat a quick breakfast and then it was off to the ticket office; where Silverstar employees were waiting with day passes.  After everyone got there pass figured out we moved on to the group photo, which was first shot in the sun facing the map, then turned around facing the town hall eatery. A quick fast food mug shot(really quick) from the photographers . After which Trevor & Cam talked to us about the competition and ended their talk and said “ okay guys, where going head down blast off to the lift now.” I looked over at Skye Schillhammer, the head nod was exchanged and we were off to the races. And soon as we got into blast off things got fast and tacky, the conditions at Silverstar are amazing right now. Skye and myself rode hard all the way to the bottom only to find we were alone, Kyle Quenell and Trevor came out next and explained to us that as soon as we had left Trevor & Cam had stopped every one and told them they were going to film blast off, a solid start to the day. After our regrouping and a chairlift ride to the top, 2 riders where paired with 1 team member. Skye and I toke Matt Montandon and headed down Superstar, teeing into Prostar & Rockstar to the bottom, the perfect warm up run. Another chair lift ride to the top and a coach switch, Skye, Mason Mashon and I headed down Rockstar to Prostar. Then, it was game time, straight into the Oakley vault. Silverstar trail crew had let us load our “small” bikes into the crew truck and brought them to the vault. A few riders switched out and tricks ensued, Brad Mills was riding his hard tail and doing some cool transfer lines and steezy one foot cans.  As riders started feeling out the speed the wood jumps at the end of course came more into play. Soon a huge money booter session began and all the riders were sending it big. After some more photographs and video, we moved on to Prostar.

Skye wanted it the whole session and stomped a massive no foot can.

The only real problem with Prostar is the fact that you can’t see the jumps from the run in. This makes competition very interesting. One to nine green jerseys stand at the roll in at any time looking thought the trees trying to spot a trick or a landing.  The reason this makes competition interesting is the fact that you can never really know how good or bad the other competitors are doing. You can ask people “what was that?” and they can tell you but you never really know how clean it was, or how big.  So you always have to come in with you’re A game.

After a speed check run I tried to tailwhip the first step up and after 2 attempt I got it on the 3rd try and coasted into a no foot can on the hip-step up (photo- Toby Rowley)

Indian Air on the Step up hip

Ben Friesen killed it with a 360 in, drop to tail whip on the hip step-up, really impressive. Kyle Quesnel 360’d the first jump,  mad tables were thrown by Spencer Graf , the list goes on the entire session was a solid show of riding ability and the level of competition here at Airprentice. Next, we moved on to “the mother” the biggest jump on Silver star, it’s an absolute monster, I counted 35 size 11 foot steps from lip to sweet spot.  And once again the level of competition was displayed by the whips of Spencer Mattews , and Brad Mills hard tail super man seat grab! and Ollie Jones attempting to spin his big bike . After a lengthy session, we pedaled in for a delicious lunch prepared by the fine chefs in the saloon, some kind of chicken wrap with waffle fries! Perfect riding food. After lunch it was the “choose your photographer challenge”, Kyle, Skye and myself took a group of 3 with 2 photographers Jerry Willows and Paris Gore. We first went to the “Semenuk Berm” on Rockstar. Jerry and Paris turned out to be a killer photographic duo as you can see.

 

Rockstar berms from down low (Photo - Jerry Willows)

Timing is key

Then on to the Rockstar 4 set, where we shot some speed and style photos through the jumps,

Clicking my tables in on the Rockstar 4 set

after which we headed down to the last hip on Rockstar where Jerry had some shots eyed up.

Rockstar singletrack

Back up to the top, we met up with Matt Dennison, the team videographer to shoot some video. We wanted to go roost some berms so we headed to Shazam, which was uncharacteristically dry, abandoned ship and jumped over to Pipedream. Jerry headed down first and found a step down he wanted to shoot, we all racered it as hard as we could. By this point it was 4:50pm, lift closed in 10 minutes. Instead of risking a fast run down, Paris Gore and myself broke off from the group and headed back to Prostar to shoot a step down.

Prostar step down tree tap

After a quick walk, some photos and fixing a ladies chain we headed back to Pipedream to meet with the rest of our crew and head home.

The dorms were nuts after riding, I first went home had a shower and went right back to start uploading photos. It was a mad sea of photographers, riders, and staff members all scrambling to computers to check out shots start bloging or editing. Dinner was pushed back an hour but eventually everyone got there shots, usb’s  traded hands more times than money. But, it was time to head back to the saloon for another great meal of beer, burgers and waffle fries! these people knew what we wanted.  After dinner, games began, Cam pulled out 100$, 3 tires, 3 sets of levers and 3 pumps. The Tire Changing contest was on, 3 heats to determine the winner, Ollie Jones squeezed past myself and Skye in the first round. Ben was underage and not allowed in the bar (poor guy), so Paris Gore the photographer replaced him against Brad mills and Spencer Graf, Brad took it. Next, Spencer Mattews, John Rempel and Kyle Quesnel, Spencer is a beast at replacing tubes and dominated the competition, finals was defaulted because Spencer’s pump was broken. Brad had finished first, but Ollie was far behind. Brad and Spencer went head to head and Brad had a huge cheering section and pulled out a win. I think he was buying drinks for his crew last night, well see how he feels this morning.

I’m really looking forward to the downhill race today, it’s been awhile since I have competed in a downhill race and I’m interested to see how things go. Dag’s is a solid racecourse with a few technical decents. I lived on Silverstar last summer but never rode Dags last year. I was really surprised with it; it’s super fun and flows well when you can find the right line. I spent some of Thursday training, Double Diamond Service Shop at Silverstar have been a huge help in preparing my bikes for competition and they are also loaning me an Aline, so that I can have a good race day.

Early this morning Kyle, Skye and myself met up at 5:30am for an early morning “Jesus Light” photo shoot. The only problem was our photographers’ alarms hadn’t gone off. After 15 minutes of knocking on doors Paris Gore finally woke up and we were off to the races. In two hours we were able to hit 4 different locations, lower Dag’s berms, new World Cup section near VFW, The Vault and Prostar.  This was the greatest photo shoot I’ve ever had we literally got every shot we wanted within 5 tries. It was great riding with two other extremely talented riders with similar goals and riding styles, as well Paris was on his game snapping money shots with amazing light and composition.

Early morning No Foot Can

Early morning on Dag's

World Cup berm ballet

Not Often your spinning 360's at 6am

Now Skye, Kyle and myself are all huddles around a table slamming cups of coffee, editing photo’s on Paris’ computer and getting our blogs done on our own. In the next 3 hours we will be back out there slaying the down hill track, laughing, riding and hanging out with some friends.

Big shout out to,

Family

NSMB.com

Double Diamond Service Shop

Silver Star Resort

Remember to thank your bike park lift attendants!

Click Link For Video

AIRprentice Entry Video

NSMB AIRprentice Photos

Photo – Joel Querin

Photo – Lauren Nolan

Photo – Tont Radomi

Photo – Ryan Seath

Photo – Lauren Nolan

Photo – Ryan Seath

Photo – Lauren Nolan

Photo – Ryan Seath

Photo – Joel Querin

Photo – Tony Radomi

Photo – Lauren Nolan

Photo – Chris Glickman

Photo – Tony Radomi

Photo – Kai Wendt

Photo – Samantha Bos

Photo – Ryan Seath

Photo – Joel Querin

Photo – Lauren Nolan

Photo – Ryan Seath

Photo – Tom Cliffe

Photo – Ryan Seath

Photo – Ryan Seath

Photo – Lauren Nolan

Photo – Liam Higgins

Photo – Chris Glickman

Photo – Ryan Seath

Photo – Ryan Seath

Photo – Kai Wendt

Photo – Liam Higgins

Photo – Ryan Seath

Photo – David Morrison

Photo – Chris Glickman

Photo – Liam HIggins

Learning to Drive

After the wind finally calmed down the park was in complete ruin. All the lips were filled in with snow and the boxes were almost completely buried in snow drifts. Jungfey (the other groomer) and myself saddled up the groomer and headed up into the park and started rebuilding lips and landings. During our time building in the park Jungfey noticed me watching his hand movement as he was driving the groomer. He managed to communicate to me that if I wanted he would teach me to drive the groomer, of course I was excited I had always wanted to drive a groomer. He began to teach me what the joystick buttons and the other switches in the groomer did. At every opportunity I got after his I would jump in the groomer with Jungfey and learn something new.

Weather

At the beginning of January Duolemeidi experienced one of the worst weather weeks I have ever seen. As I mentioned in my earlier posts there are days where the wind is ridiculously strong. For an entire week we had some of the highest wind I have ever seen, this was probably one of the most boring weeks I have ever had at a ski resort 2 of our 3 lifts were closed. It was always freezing cold and so windy if you were brave enough to go outside you needed ski poles to push yourself downhill. Spent a lot of time doing nothing and working on homework this week.

Birthday

Two days after christmas it was my birthday, took a day off stayed at home and relaxed. After sleeping for the bulk of the day I woke up and walked to the instructors home. Simon in addition to bringing me a bottle of whiskey also brought me two cans of mushrooms soup so I could make porkchops. Nadia and I walked around Chong li collecting ingredients, then we went home and I started cooking. I was a little nervous about cooking for the instructors, I was mainly worried that they wouldn’t like it. Anyways they did like it. Today was little bit of a rough day for me, at home birthdays aren’t a big deal for me I always told people not to make a big deal out of it, but of course everyone did. I was extremly lonely today, but the instructors once again proved there friendship to me all of them remembered it was my birthday and either in english or chinese wished me a happy one. In addition to wishing me a happy birthday they bought me a cake, a cake, so simple, just one little thing that shows you people care. Its amazing how such a simple little thing can make you feel like you are at home. I will never forget this cake.

Christmas Day

I was expecting christmas to be huge day as far as numbers go, I was a little disappointed in the numbers. Anyways it had been discussed a few days before christmas that I would be wearing a santa for christmas day. As soon as customers showed up at the resort I threw on the santa suit, grabbed my bag of candy and began walking around the lodge yelling loud “ho ho ho’s” the chinese seemed scared of me initially. I don’t think they had ever seen a white santa or maybe it was just that fact that I was so loud who knows, but I definitely scared a couple of children. Later in the day Andy the marketing lady  told me there was a magazine photographer from Beijing up at Duolemeidi and he would like to take some photos with me in the santa suit. I went up to the top of the mountain where the photo crew was waiting, we toke photo’s for about an hour but, the magazine just recently came out and none of the photo’s were used. Too bad, anyways after work  I was invited to christmas dinner in the Isnow(a hotel in town). I headed to the Isnow for dinner, driving down from the resort I was picturing Turkey, mashed potatoes, cranberrie sauce, pie, all the comforts from home I was missing. Instead when I got into the Isnow resturant I was greeted by pizza, cold french fries, spaghetti, minestrone soup and sausage. Dinner was good but definitely not what I was hoping for, the nice part was Simon had brought me up a present from Beijing, a bottle of Jack Daniels, a small comfort from home. After everyone had left the restaurant Lee, Lee’s girlfriend from Beijing, Datoe, Xu Hong and the lift maintenance guy and his girlfriend stayed behind and had some cake and a glass of whiskey. Which was really nice good cake, good liquor and good friends, a true comfort from home.

Christmas Eve

This year was my first christmas away from home, so it was a little different, especially since I was spending it in a place where the traditions are completly different from our traditions at home. Anyways on christmas eve Xu Hong took me and some of the other staff out for a hot pot dinner, hot pot is like a fondue but instead of cheese it’s a spicy broth that you put raw meats and vegetables into to cook them, then eat them. Anyways we had a nice dinner nothing special, it’s what happened during dessert. Joanna pulled up a mandarin orange wrapped in a pink bag. This was kind of a slap in the face of reality, the reality that for the first time in my life I was away from home for christmas and I was half way across the world, really made me miss home and my family. You see it’s a tradition in my household to eat a mandarin orange on christmas morning. It may not have been christmas morning but it definitely made me miss what ever was going on at home.