Every year myself, along side an amazing crew, put on one of the biggest mountain bike events in North America. It’s a slopestyle formatted bike event that draws riders from all over the world. Every year this event seems to get bigger and bigger. Naturally, this year, history repeated itself…again. Our event, Goat Style Bike Jam, is now affiliated with the World Mountain Bike Association (which is a series of events spread across the world that are based on a points system) which effectively confirms Goat Style as an elite event in the mountain biking world.
Goat Style is built in 5 days. Of course, it takes a year of planning, but the actual venue is contstructed in 5- 13hr consecutive days. It’s very intense, it’s always way too hot, but it’s fun, a different kind of fun, but really fun. Our “build” week creates community. Yes, it’s a really hard week–building, shoveling, walking up and down a hill 6 bazillion times, hammering, sweating, chainsawing, etc. It’s on ya from start to finish…but the end result is always rewarding.
This year ended up being a little different. We built things bigger, our rider capacity (how many riders were competing) was exceeded, there was a deeper attendance of spectators, more sponsors, more vendors, rider ability was heightened, everything had jumped a notch. This is a good thing. It was super overwhelming but our crew handled it confidently.
On the Saturday of the event things were going really good. The wind was picking up but there wasn’t much concern to go along with that. Around 3:30pm one of our crew received a phone call from his dad, who was further up the lake (in Creston, BC) and said there was a huge storm brewing up there. Now, typically when there’s a storm up the lake it usually sweeps around the town of Creston without much concern. So, we carried on. The black clouds that were once “just up the lake” began creeping towards Creston. Before we knew it the storm had reached Creston. The wind was blowing intensely…tents started to chatter. The level of concern went from “whatever” to “oh crap”.
Suddenly the Red Bull Arch collapsed, a 20x20 big white tent blew 5ft from it’s original position, people scattered to address the beginning of mayhem. Next, everyone in sight began screaming. I let go of the big white tent that wanted to fly away, looking up the hill I then watched a 20ft high x 10ft wide x 25ft long scafolding structure get lifted off the ground and thrown like a kite. Only 5 minutes before there were people on and around that structure. Racing as fast as i could I made my way up the hill. The wind was blowing violently. The rubble of scafolding was 15ft high. Scrambling to dig through the mess, searching to see if anyone was under it.
As i sat on the hill in shock of what just happened, in shock that no one had been hurt, tents blowing through the air, steal structures crashing to the ground, thousands running around in panic mode, I couldn’t believe my eyes. Our event was running smoothly…and then pandemonium…just like that. I couldn’t move. I had nothing to say.
There had been a lot of talk about Goat Style moving away from Creston. There had even been offers for a new venue. But after watching our crew piece back together the Goat Style course, leaving it in a condition that riders liked even more then the first look, it was confirmed that Goat Style needs to stay where it is. It was inspiring to see certain crew step up in amongst the chaos and take control. What was shattered, restoration and courage stood tall.
I’ve been home for four days now and still feel weird about Goat Style 2010. It ended up being very successful, which is rad. But there’s still something about the screaming, the sound of the screaching metal crashing to the ground, about the crew that i worked with, the “family” that persevered through the mayhem. I’m sure my head will be back to normal in no time…but it’s still weird.
On a completely different note, I took 11 days off of climbing which also felt weird. But it seems as though my body needed that as my first day back on I felt stronger than i have ever before. Last night i came really close to a project i’m working on. This route, last year i couldn’t touch the crux moves. This year, i’m breezing through them without a ton of trouble. That’s cool. Training works!
I’ve attached a link to the video from the event i’m involved with.
More to come.
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