Sweet Home Mountain Creek

I love launching off this container drop.

It turned out to be the best weekend of racing so far this year. I was really excited to be racing my home bike park with both my Mountain Creek friends and my Eastern States Cup buddies, and things did not disappoint.

The race course used about 90% of an old ProGRT course on the mountain, and I love to ride that trail. I ride it at least once, if not twice, every time we go to Mountain Creek. A few sections are featured in my Flying Flannel video.

The course starts with a steep drop-in out of the gate, then heads for the Oakley drop - it's not big jump, but the positioning is a little unnerving as it sits directly under the lift and the whole mountain seems to drop away below...it feels like you're launching off the mountainside. 

Down further, you encounter the first of two nasty rock gardens. The trick is to bash away and hope your arms don't give up if run into something too abruptly. The centerpiece of the course is a 50 foot rock face. The face is incredibly steep with a very narrow line of descent, and getting properly lined up for the thing is quite tricky, just by how the trail comes into it at the top. Over the past year, I have seen more than a few people turn away after they stop to check it out.

The course ends with a super fun launch off a shipping container. I totally sent it on my race run, yelling "Let's do it!!!" as I flew through the air.

My race run was fast, clean, and smooth - it was my best top to bottom run of the race course that weekend. It wasn't quite fast enough to catch my buddy Colt, who has turned into a powerful rider. But I was very happy with my run and stoked to land second and share the podium with both Colt and Tristen. 

A big shout out to Dylan and Sean at Hickory & Tweed bike shop for getting me up and running for this race, as I had destroyed my rim the previous weekend at Windham. You guys rock!