NorCal MTB Racing This Weekend: May 8 - 9, 2010

For those of you making your weekend plans, here is quick rundown of this weekend's MTB racing schedule for Norcal:

1. SB Racing.org, Winter XC MTB Series 2010 Round 4, Santa Teresa (Saturday): The penultimate race in the series moves to Santa Teresa Park.
2. Red Tail Adventure Race (Saturday): Big Blue Adventure is putting on both an XTERRA and Adventure Race May 8th in Del Valle Regional Park, near Livermore. There will be a short and long course option for both the XTERRA and Adventure Race. The Adventure Race takes advantage of Del Valle’s plush single track, and large lake. It features kayaking, allowing racers to take a cool break on a sure to be warm day (kayaks are provided for the sprint race). The course is designed by ARNavSupplies’ Mark Manning.
3. XTERRA Del Valle (Saturday): XTERRA Del Valle promises to be a fun and challenging course. Racers will swim in the calm lake at the heart of Del Valle, and ride and run through the surronding single track. Both races will end with a after party of food, cold beer and a raffle where as much $3,500 of Salomon, Merrell and other sponsor swag will be given away.
4. Lake Sonoma Series (Saturday): The Lake Sonoma series has moved to a new site but the North Bay favorite is still technical.
5. CCCX Summer DH #4 (Sunday): The CCCX DH series will be back in action for the Mother's Day at Toro Park. "The past few weeks of sunny weather has dried up the wet sections of trails in the interior of the canyons at Toro Park. This should allow for usage of one of my favorite trails in Toro Park, the Bessie Canyon blitz section I created over the past season. This new portion of trail is looking better then ever. As usual I will have a few new surprises for the route to spice up the DH shredding that Nor-Cal's best riders deliver each CCCX event.

NorCal MTB Racing This Weekend: April 3-4, 2010

Sorry again for the blackout on the site this week, real life and work have been getting in the way.

While I haven't posted much, it's not that there is a lack of news. Just this week, I've received news of two reschedules, three new race series (Summit Shorty, Nevada Cup and Reno Wheelmen Twilight) and some other interesting bits. Most of the news races and reschedules have been added to the calendar. If everything goes well, you should see a veritable torrent of posts this weekend (keeps fingers crossed).

For those of you who haven't checked the calendar lately, the SB Racing XC Series #4 has been postponed due to a scheduling problems and will now by May 22nd at Fort Ord.

For those of you making your weekend plans, here is quick rundown of this weekend's MTB racing schedule for Norcal:

1. CCCX XC (04/03/10): "The course for Race #4 of the CCCX XC Series will use similar trails as the previous 2 races, but in reverse direction. The climbs that peppered race route #3 and tested endurance and strength of all the Central Coast racers will be replaced with mostly fast sections of fun riding single track. Of course there will be a large amount of uphill hits riders will face each lap, but for the most part this race #4 course route will be full throttle for the CCCX riders. Most of the climbs are between 5% and 7% grade, with a majority of the race route sending the riders ripping through turns and dicing down single track trails. Race Safe & Have Fun!"
2. Boggs V (04/03/10): While this has been sold out for a while, it looks like the weather Saturday should be good.
3. Gold Country Gravity Cup #1 (04/03/10): "Due to the lack of entries for this race, we had 8 as of yesterday, we have cancelled the event but we are doing $10.00 all day shuttles and your $10.00 will include a BBQ! Don’t miss out on this great event. Just bring your bike and 10 bones). Don’t forget, a BBQ is included!!"
4. Folsom Lake Sprint Adventure Race (04/03/10)

NorCal MTB Racing This Weekend: March 27 & 28

Sorry for the lack of posts this week, I've been traveling again.

Big news (and I'm a bit late on this) is that CCCX #4 is being postponed due to scheduling issues.

For those of you making your weekend plans, here is quick rundown of the remaining MTB racing schedule for NorCal:

1. SB Racing Winter XC MTB Series, Round 3 Henry Coe State Park (03/27/10)
2. Big Sandy Race (03/28/10)
3. Stone's Throw Short Track (03/28/10)

2010 SBracing.org Winter Series #2 Results

The results for 2nd round of the SBracing.org Winter Series have been posted:

Kevin Smallman – Overall Winner Riding For Cannondale Racing
Shelly Monroe - Overall Female Winner Riding from SBRacing.org / Buy-Cell.com
John Carr – Cat 2 Winner Riding For Team Dynamic
Dianne Zinchini – Cat 2 Female Winner
Ted Thomas – Cat 3 Winner
Jennifer Grifall – Cat 3 Female Winner Riding for SBRacing.org / Grifall Family Chiropractic

Full results are available here. Photos are here.

For a writeup on the event, see the SB RACING website.

SB Winter Series #2 Preview

At least one of the races this weekend is definitely on...

The Race Is A Go..

As the morning rain clears we are still committed to running the event Saturday. We will be out marking tomorrow and Friday and will let you know of more developments as we learn them. At this point, all we can do is to provide a great course and control as much as we can without worrying about the weather. That means we will be making every effort to do speedy results so you can race, win, podium and leave as quickly as possible. Beginners, Sports, and Experts podiums will be done as soon as we have enough finishers from each category to do so.

We will be providing little packets of hand warmers/work well on the feet too, to those who would like them at sign ups until we run out! Hoping for a break in the rain Saturday by 10 am for a great start to the race!

via SB Racing website.

NorCal MTB Racing This Weekend: March 6-7, 2010

For those of you making your weekend plans, here is quick rundown of this weekend's MTB racing schedule for NorCal (for races that haven't been cancelled):

1. SB Racing, Winter XC MTB Series, Round 2 Fort Ord (Saturday)
2. MTB Challenge #3 (Sunday)
3. Stone's Throw Short Track (Sunday)

2010 SB Racing Winter XC #1 Results

SB Racing finally caught some luck this weekend and held their first XC race of the year. A recap from their website:

I don't much believe in luck, rather proper preparation is my preference. But when it came to the weather today, I was very pleased with the way the clouds hovered overhead but never opened up...and I think most of our racers would agree that one mud pit was enough! For those of you in attendance, we thank you very much for coming out and we hope you continue to ride with us as we are excited by all of the positive feedback we received. The response we got was overwhelmingly positive despite some last minute changes and having challenging course conditions (Harvey Bear locals said they had never seen anything like that before!). Despite the wet winter, we did the best we could and were pleased that most people were able to enjoy it.

And, boy did these guys & gals enjoy it!
Greg Heinz - Overall Winner riding for SBRacing.org
Shelly Monroe - Overall Female riding for SBRacing.org / Buy-Cell.com
Tim Keller - Cat 2 Winner riding for SBRacing.org
Becky Brain - Cat 2 Female Winner for Pleasant Hill Cyclery
Jack Schluckbier - Cat 1 Winner
Jennifer Grifall - Cat 1 Female Winner for Grifall Family Chiropractic

Via SB Racing.

Photos and some video can be found at Assured Photo.

NorCal MTB Racing This Weekend: Feb 20-21

For those of you making your weekend plans, here is quick rundown of this weekend's MTB racing schedule for Northern California:

1. SB Racing.org, Winter XC MTB Series 2010, Round 1 (02/20/10)
2. MTB Challenge #2 (02/21/10)
3. South Valley Endurance Dirty Gears Series #1 (02/21/10)
4. Stone's Throw Short Track (02/21/10)

SBRacing.org Winter Series #1 is On

With the great weather that we've been experiencing, it looks like the Bay Area trails have dried out enough for this weekend's SBracing.org's Winter XC Series #1:

HARVEY BEAR IS ON!

Wow, to get to the point where we could declare that headline has taken an immense amount of work, patience and cooperation with the rangers at Harvey Bear. In the end, we all gave a bit so that we could make this event happen. The rangers were awesome in allowing us to use the portion of the park that is in the best condition and we are planning on running this sucker rain or shine.

With the park restrictions, we are re-working the course we had originally intended. For everyone dying to know the course all we can say tonight is this: The park has been closed. It will remain closed until the race. This means that everyone will pretty much be on equal, if not unfamiliar footing. Once our Course Captain lays it out we will do our BEST to provide details to help you plan race strategy. For those thinking that SBRacing team members have home court advantage, I would just like to kindly say that our race team is largely based in Monterey and most of them have called me asking for directions to Harvey Bear...The team members who know the course will be working the event.

Last word on the course: We think it will be about a nine mile lap that breaks down like:
1 lap - Cat 3 / Beg
2 laps - Cat 2 / Sport
3 laps - Cat 1 / Expert / Pro's
IF it rains, we MAY shorten the course to keep the fun factor high and reduce the mud factor a bit. Keep in mind, we want everyone to HAVE FUN, that will be our motivation.

The race starts at 10 AM on Saturday (2/20/10) at Harvey Bear Lake (approximate map) near Gilroy, CA.

Full information available at SB RACING.

SB Racing #1 Postponed (Again)

It's a bad news, good news situation with the new SB Racing Winter XC series:

Santa Teresa on 2/12/10 is now on May 8, 2010.
Please note that Round 1 will now be held May 8th as a later event in the series.

As much as we love a good mud run, we are at the mercy of the facility we are using and right now the rangers at Santa Teresa don't want their park to get hammered by us any further than Mother Nature already has. Probably understandable. As such, we are shooting for May flowers and hopefully Spring sunshine and prime racing conditions on May 8th.

Just like previously, entries to the current event are still transferable to any race in the series and we are again, very apologetic and very appreciative of your patience and understanding with the uncharacteristically wet weather.

Upcoming Events
2/20/10 Harvey Bear Ranch
3/6/10 Fort Ord
3/27/10 Henry Coe Fundraiser
4/3/10 Santa Teresa
5/8/10 Santa Teresa
Summer/Fall Series to Follow

So to recap: SB Racing series pushed back due to weather, but there may be a Summer/Fall series.

New Date For SB Racing Winter #1

and the new date for this weekend's rained/washed out SB Racing Winter Series #1 is ...

NEW ROUND 1 DATE: Saturday, FEBRUARY 13th. Mark it down...See you there!

We have confirmation from the rangers that we can officially reschedule this weekend's opening round event for Saturday, February 13th. Weather willing and after a few sacrifices to El Nino, we will plan for the NEWLY Scheduled Round 1 to go off without incident and under what we hope to be much more fun trail conditions on a course that will be fun and challenging enough on its own! This leaves two more weekends to hit the pedals and enter this first round at the level of fitness that we were all hoping for! Can't wait to see everyone on the 13th! Thanks again for your patience.

The calendar is already is updated.

SB Racing Winter #1 Postponed

It looks like the heavy rains this wake have claimed their first race casualty:

IMPORTANT ROUND 1 ANNOUNCEMENT:
Due to excessively rainy and wet conditions the park rangers have asked us to re-schedule Round 1 of the series to be held at Santa Teresa Park. More details with regards to a new date to follow soon. For all you "pre-entries" you will be able to use this entry towards a future race. Again, stay tuned, there will be more information to come as we learn it. Thank you for your patience. -SBRacing.org

Via SB RACING

SB Racing Winter #1 Decision Tomorrow

Due to the heavy rains across NorCal the past few weeks, the first round of the SB Racing Winter Series may be moved:

Faithful following,
An official decision for the first round event at Santa Teresa this weekend will be forthcoming tomorrow (Wednesday). We realize that El Nino doesn't want to be left off the starting line and would also like to participate in our events. However, our primary concern is cooperating with the parks department and promoting the best possible event for our racers! Check back tomorrow for the official announcement. Thank you for your patience. -SBRacing.org

Via SB RACING.

We'll have an update as soon as we hear something ... check back tomorrow for the official decision.

New Bay Area Winter Series from SB Racing

The folks who brought you last year's South Valley Bike and Run Club races in the South Bay are back with a Winter XC series:

We just wanted to let your riders know about a great XC MTB Winter Series, a terrific time to check their early season fitness in action!

• Sat, Jan 30th, 2010 - Santa Teresa Park
• Sat, Feb 20th, 2010 - Harvey Bear
• Sat, Mar 6th, 2010 - Fort Ord
• Sat, Mar 27th, 2010 - Henry Coe State Park
• Sat, Apr 3rd, 2010 - TBA

The first event will be a great way to check your early season fitness. Good climbs, fun technical single track and fast fire roads. Many of you have ridden Santa Teresa and will have an idea of what to expect...It's pretty much everything you would want in a fun and challenging mountain bike race! All events will be USA Cycling Sanctioned.

All the details are on their new site at http://www.sbracing.org/ and I'll enter them into the calendar.