Well, we all managed to survive the RAID. In fact, everyone (except me) managed to get themselves some swanky prizes and some time on the podium. There is a very limited selection of photos from the event on the organizer's flickr photostream here. The results can be found in confusing PDF’s on the FQSC website here.
To save people some time flipping through all those PDF’s here’s the results for the “Grand Cumulatif Scratch”, or the cumulative results for the whole weekend for everyone who did the “big one”.
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| like always, click image to make it bigger/legible |
Riders from Ottawa will notice there are a few familiar names in the top 10 for both the male and female categories.
Anna O'Brien from "Tall Tall Cycles" (see results) finished third overall for the women on her custom mountain 29er tall bike.
Anna O'Brien from "Tall Tall Cycles" (see results) finished third overall for the women on her custom mountain 29er tall bike.
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| Anna's 29er (left) and spare 24er (right) |
In the men's results you'll also notice Ryan Atkins in 2nd (his account of the race HERE), Neil Schiemann in 3rd about 7 min behind, and Imad El-Ghazal in 6th all riding for Kunstadt Sports Cycling Club. Matt Surch and David Stachon from Tall Tree Cycles also ended up in the top 10. Good performance from all, and a good showing for the "underdog" ontarians.
My race report will conisist of a rundown of each stage from my perspective, the overall results for the stage as well as some GPS data for stages 2 and 3. Sorry about the length: it seems like the race report ended up being almost as epic as the race itself.
Stage 1: TO THE TOP
The first stage of this year’s RAID started right by the parking lot at the base of Mont Sainte Anne and took riders to the top (literally right to the top of the gondola at the summit) of the ski hill on a combination of service road and double track on ski hills. It was fairly cool and wet, but since this was going to be a "hillclimb" stage, most riders were wearing short sleeves and shorts with limited water and tools.
According to a number of people that had done this stage in previous years, they made a few drastic changes to the course. This year, instead of climbing to the summit and riding the gondola down, we would have an 11km descent through double and single track trails back to the base. This descent was super fun with a few “a-line” type sections of trail with berms and small jumps.Another change that was made was that they took us off the service road about ¾ of the way up and directed us straight up part of the ski hill, resulting in a lot of people having to get off and run.
This was a very challenging climb for me with about 500m of steep climbing (perhaps someone who had their GPS on during this stage can provide a more specific number). The total time for the stage ended up being a little over an hour for most of us. Everything went pretty well for me on this stage, with no flats and no mechanical issues, just a lot of mud in my eyes.
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Stage 2: Quebec to MSA
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| The ominous elevation profile.. of DOOOOM |
Stage 2 of this 3 day stage race is where the men started to break away from the mice. I found out at about the 55-60km mark that I was actually a mouse as I slipped into a trance of complete bonk and granny geared my way back to Mont Sainte Anne, dreaming of hot showers, hot chocolate and steaks on the barbie. At this point I was no longer “racing” but only trying to finish the day and avoid a DNF. Probably one of the worst bonks I’ve had in quite a while, I was totally out of it and even steering my bike down to the finish line seemed to be almost impossible.
While the huge amount of climbing in this stage could easily be blamed for my catastrophic blow up I think it could have also had something to do with all those dozens of kilometres trying to power through super sucky/sticky mud on the hydrocut trails. This was a mountain bike race unlike any other one I’ve done: there was a lot of open double track, some road (paved and unpaved), cold river crossings and lots and lots of mud. This was no O-Cup…
It all started in scenic Vieux Quebec
The pace car and police motorcycles pulled off the road as the group was directed onto a gravel double track under some power lines and a pair of ATV’s took over the pace setting. This marked the end of the neutral start, and all the favourites ramped up the pace up this first climb into the hydrocut trails, stringing out the group. By the top of the climb the race had been broken up into a bunch of smaller groups as everyone headed down the first rocky descent into the muddy, rocky, swampy hydrocut.
The race basically followed this hydrocut all the way to the 40km mark, where it headed out onto a paved road and past the start of the day’s shorter event and the third feed zone. I pulled over here and refilled my two bottles, since I had skipped the first two feed zones. *I probably should have grabbed some extra food here, and my day could have been a lot more enjoyable.* After this feed zone there was a gradual gravel road climb that got ugly when we were sent up a super steep ATV trail into the woods (the huge spike on the elevation profile). This was pretty much unrideable for me and I ran the majority of it. At this point I was also mixed in with a bunch of people from the shorter event, as they had just started which added some fun to the mix.
After the summit of this will breaking hike a bike we descended down to the bottom of the Mont Sainte Anne lift (on the north side) and trudged our way back around the mountain to the finish. Passing by the lifts was a bit of a trip, because it made you feel as though you were really close to the finish, when in reality you had a pretty serious climb left and probably about 15km of riding. This is where I really started to lose touch with reality and 50+ sport women on freeride bikes putted past me in their granny gears as I swerved my way up the final climb (true story).
As I haven’t spent too much time riding around Ste Anne it came as a total surprise to me when I came out of the woods and saw the finish. I managed to muster enough energy to make it over the curvy wooden ramp thing and went straight through the finish to the peanut/kronobar/chicken broth/water station and ate an obscene amount of free snacks.
Stage 3: Trails at MSA
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| Stage 3 Elevation (missing first 3km) For me, stage 3 started out with a quick reminder of the previous day’s stage when I couldn’t get my Garmin to start recording because there was too much dried up mud in the buttons. Luckily I got it started about 3km into the ride when the sweat off my brow and persistent rain was able to dissolve the mud in the buttons. Contrary to the map from my Garmin, the race actually started and finished at the same point and a keen eye will notice on the elevation profile that there’s about 200m of climbing missing at the start. The start took us down a paved road through the village of chalets and accommodations adjacent to Ste Anne, then up a double track climb. This was a tough way to start the day, as we basically coasted down the road in a big group then everyone went full tilt on this fairly large climb to get themselves into a better position. My approach was a bit different for this stage than on the previous day: I decided to stay within my comfort zone on this first climb in an attempt to save my legs for the climbs to come. The three major climbs were right in the middle of the stage (see elevation profile above), and having studied the profile before I knew when to expect them and roughly how long they were. I also made a point of eating every 45min-1hr and I drank three full bottles (including one that was half water/half red bull).This stage ended up being a lot more fun as it was mostly trails with a bit more single track and some good climbs (and I didn't bonk). The climbs in this stage were a bit more manageable (not as steep) for my limited gear ratio and fitness level and I was able to finish the race in a normal mental state. I was even able to do a bit of racing and ended up duking it out with a few riders in the final few km’s. |
Summary
I would recommend this race to anyone who’s looking for a good challenge, something different that the usual O-Cup, Q-Cup race, or someone who has an interest in stage races but doesn’t have the money/time for the big ones like BC bike race or transrockies. Just make sure if it's gonna be a rainy weekend, you bring some mud tires and lots of tools/spare tubes: I saw lots of people cursing their hutchinson pythons on those slip-n-slide mud chute climbs and heard about lots of flats.
All in all it was an excellent weekend of epic riding, bike cleaning, eating and general tom foolery. Thanks goes out to all the people who made it happen, and to the Kunstadt Sports trailer for getting our bikes there.
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