Hoff Fest – 3

Well, it’s not pouring rain today.  But it did last night, so the jumps are still pretty wet.  Everyone put in some more time trying to install drainage, but it’s just not happening.  I guess we’ll have to do something else, like set a new record for dollar amount on the roof of the van (well north of a hundred grand with this load…).

I think we should also maybe head up to Reco for some big mountain riding.  Or more accurately, the boys decided we should go up to Reco for some big mountain riding and I tried to just hang on to the tail of the dragon…

Can you guess what they’re thinking?

I wonder if they expected to see the girls on top of the peak waiting for them though.

Buehler is having first and second thoughts here, but it goes.  You know it’s going to just take one guy to make the move and it’s going to go down.

And Doerfling pops the Reco face cherry!

Quickly followed by Alex (I’m not sure if that’s Pro or Volokhov, but they rode similar lines so you can pretend it’s whichever one you like best).

Then Sorge and Aggy dropped in via the summit couloir, prompting a regular avalanche of debris and freeriders.

Buehler…

…and Vink…

…and Herb.

..and finally Andreu, who rode it faster than anyone.  Probably in large part due to his nearly bald rear tire.

The boys at the bottom, although we’re still near the top of the ride.  Somewhere near there is Sorge’s GoPro, which he lost when he dropped his helmet while dodging rocks falling from above.  It’s in the bowl somewhere, along with another dozen or so that have been lost around here over the past few winters.

Once again, I’m sort of surprised that they’re that into riding steep scree.  I guess what’s old is new again, sort of like neon colours and long top tubes.

Here’s the whole dirty crew for you.

Meanwhile, Gnargus was waiting patiently for the gang so he could make a few bucks today.

Sorry buds, they didn’t feel like working it for you.  Except James.  He put in some high exposure ridgeline time.

I’m pretty sure that things are going to work out alright for Riga later in the week, but in the meantime we still have another day or two of indeterminate weather to wait out before we know what day this is going to go down on.

Hoff Fest – 2

Well, the jumps were already wet, and the 24 hour forecast was continued wetter, so last night was declared a party night.  Where Jordie may or may not have been giving out free tattoos with a shishkebab skewer and bic pen ink.  And I may or may not have pics…but I admit to nothing.

This is something I think we can all agree on.

As good as that party was, we couldn’t lounge around the lodge all day.  Time to get this train rollin’.

The Fest jumps may have been too wet, but you just can’t keep these guys down.  Here’s that inimitable Sorge whip, and a big no-hander from Doerfling.

Buehler led the train down to his line behind the lodge, while Gnargus looked on.

All that before lunch.

After lunch we went up a bit higher to check out the sub-alpine.  Still kind of greybird, but I think the boys liked it.

Almost as much as they liked this tailings pile.  I think it’s cute the way the new schoolers are into the old school steeps.  I’m thinking we may be seeing more of this kind of action as the week goes on.  Doesn’t look like it’s going to dry out anytime soon.

Wanna see what some of those jumps look like in action?  Here’s a vid that Mitch Cheek over at Solos Productions put together last year for the lodge.

Hoff Fest – 1

Well, it’s time to get the party started. Except that Mother Nature is really not co-operating. The track needed a ton of work. Good thing we had all these high end athletes at our disposal.

It’s like a union gig or something.  Nico was gettin’ er dun, so really we didn’t have much to do.

However, it was looking pretty damn good by the afternoon.  Enough so that the boys thought about it…

…and Alex greased  it.

That’s one hell of a sender to be a guinea pig on.  The pic does NOT do it justice, especially when you consider that the in run was the consistency of plasiticene.  Jordie had a gnarly case and crash from it.  Even Aggy hung it a bit, and that kid knows a thing or two about poppin lips.

To give you a better idea of the conditions and the track layout, have a gander it this:

Hoff Fest 2014 Course Preview from fest series on Vimeo.

After one day, Alex Pro is our leader on points. Not sure who’s assigning the points, but that guy is killin’ it out there.