Jeep King of the Mountain: Totally Aggro
Aug 09 2007 / The Canyons, Park City, UT
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Tires bash in the mad pedal rush to get to the berm first. The high rider is ejected over the handlebars and flips 15 feet through the air, landing hard on her back in the rock garden below. There is dead silence for the long minutes it takes Tara Llannes to move; applause as she is carried off the course and given oxygen. An event car transports her down the mountain, she sags against the door, face drained white and twisted in pain.
She is back at the start for the consolation round, pale and sweating, but unwilling to give it away to her opponent. Maybe she can be third instead of fourth; add a couple of thou to her winnings.
"We're the richest purse in professional mountain bike racing," says Al Sommers, PR dude for Jeep's three-stop series that is the World Professional Mountain Bike Championships.
It's an exciting event for spectators; a combo of motocross, BMX, downhill racing and a bit of hockey checking; with an elimination format that guarantees aggression and suspense.
The opening event at The Canyons on August 4 was an invitational field of both mountain bikers and BMX racers. As is traditional with Jeep's King of the Mountain (JKOM) events, local riders were also invited. Park City's Gale Dahlager and Chris Vandine are NORBA contenders and winners of nearly every local comp they enter. But they were no match against this uber-tough field; Vandine came in DFL and Dahlager was next to last.
The dual format course is also called 'supercross' or 'Y-cross," because the two lanes at the start quickly narrow, like the shape of the letter Y. Each rider tries to get to the 'stem' first, because it's hard to pass once the course narrows. They must balance their big ones with prudence. Riders get two runs for each heat, one on the red course, one on the blue. Timing begins only when one rider goes through the finish; that starts the clock. The measured seconds between the first and second rider is called the "differential." The rider with the lowest differential after two runs is the winner of that heat.
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Behind the horse gates at the start, riders balance on their pedals while the starter counts cadence: "Red course ready, Blue course ready, course is clear, GO!" The gates open and it's on. The ones who made it to the semis and finals all threw their bikes out of the fallaway start and immediately began power pedaling.
On this course, the winner of each heat was decided within the first 70 feet. There were three small jumps after the short downhill from the gate, then a tight, banked berm. Whoever got to the berm first would be first to the motocross style jumps and in the lead at the bottom, where the dirt course turned onto an asphalt street. There, riders had one last chance to take the lead via a come-from-behind sprint before a sharp left turn brought them to the finish.
In the men's first heat, three time World Champion pro downhill racer "Flyin" Brian Lopes rubbed wheels with Cody Warren; Lopes went down and never could regain, didn't make the semi-finals.
"Rubbin' is racing," explained rider Rich Houseman, adding "You can't physically knock someone off the track, of course, but you can block pass or put your elbow in front of somebody. Once you're in front, you need to put as big a gap as you can between you and the one behind you."
Most of the women's field came out of the gate timidly on the first heat, perhaps because of the near vert downhill start. They coasted to the berm and beyond. The exception was Jill Kintner, who realized that gravity may be your friend, but pedal power is a better friend. She was the only woman who cranked it right from the start, she pedaled up and down the first little jumps, around the berm, and in every heat made it to the finish while the second rider was still on the asphalt.
Speed and power was the key; not finesse. Riders were going some 50 mph when they hit the street; there was no braking until the finish. The athletes agreed it was the fastest JKOM course they had ever ridden.
Men's winner Michal Prokop was surprised. He said, "It was the same distance, but way much faster. I'm more of a BMX guy than a mountain bike racer." The secret to his win, he said, was, "I tried to make it to the berm first, then I just tried to be smooth and keep my flow all the way down."
Prokop and Jared Graves duked it out so closely in the championship round that the timer had to be consulted before the winner was announced. Both are come-from-behind kings, and only a few hundredths of a second separated them over both runs. Eric Carter was third.
The women's race had the drama, and not just because of Llanes' fall. In the first heat, Melissa Buhl underestimated local rider Gale Dahlager; didn't realize what a threat she was, then woke up and barely squeaked through with one of the closest wins of the day. After that, Dahlager faded.
In the semis, Llanes checked Buhl to take a small lead. On the next run, both charged to the berm; they bumped tires. Llanes flew off her bike and over the berm. The other side was a vert fallaway, down to the rocks below. When Buhl saw Llanes endo, she stopped, called out, wanted to see that her opponent was okay. It was a class act.
It was announced Llanes, now in the consolation round for third and fourth place, had withdrawn. But she came back against Anneke Beerten. Though Llanes won the second run, it wasn't by enough. Beerten had a big differential from the first run, and took third, leaving Llanes fourth place. Llanes said, "I didn't want to quit. I'm pretty sore, but the adrenaline was kicking in, when it wears off, I'll be in a lot of pain."
Woman's winner Jill Kintner exulted over her win, not so much in the victory but in the lead time. She won every round by a second or more. Standing in the inflatable green horseshoe of the finish, she laughed and gave credit to her opponent, second place finisher Buhl; saying, "That was a hard race. Melissa's always a tough competitor, I just gave it everything I had."
When Kintner came through the finish, she was suddenly surrounded by a pack of little girls holding out posters and pieces of paper. None of them had come out for any of the male finishers; but here was a small crowd of them, all with wide, star-struck eyes, looking at a woman who was their hero. Reporters had to wait while Kinter signed everything, including shirts and small bike helmets, laughing with the kids.
She could be the star bike racing needs.
-- Wina Sturgeon
