Monday, January 28, 2013

Blubber Burn Classic IV: Race Report & Results

Scott Mitchell photo

Four years running and The Blubber Burn Classic is faster, fiercer, and more ridiculous than ever.

Billed as the most technical cyclocross race of the year, this 45 minutes spent on sweet singletrack is about as far from a conventional cross course as you can get.

Click through the break for more pictures and to find out what went down.

  

The Course
Twisting through Victoria's Hartland MTB park, the perennial course features a loose fire road climb to a rolling singletrack section.

Pretty quickly the buff trail gives way to a nasty rock run-up and a series of tire-eating drops, ruts and roots. More elevation is gained, guts puked out, and a hair-raising descent mixes sharp singletrack and tricky lines towards the finish.

A decidedly UCI-illegal lumberjack barrier slows the mad dash to the start/ finish area: a tunnel of fan-fuelled heckling, fireworks and broken bikes. Do that 5 times and collapse at the line.

Scott Mitchell photo

The Results
1- Tom "Power-to-Weight" Skinner
2- Jamie "Crusher" Cameron
3- Eric "The Nice Guy" [MTB]
4- Clay "60psi" Webb [SSCX}

The Gory Details
Similar to the 2012 edition, race director Halldor lined the competitors up for a Le Mans start. With a twist.

A sizable chunk of overgrown forest and a scramble over a slick bolder stood between the racers and their bikes.

Returning champion, Tom Skinner, started strong and held his considerable lead to the end, racking up his third consecutive victory.

In complete disregard for their hallowed cotton casing, Jamie Cameron managed to flat his Dugast tubular late in the race, execute a wheel change, and defend his second place. Hopefully this isn't the last time a Dugast meets its maker at the Dump.

Third across the line, and first in the SSMTB category was Eric. Grinning, or maybe grimacing, and spinning madly.

Fourth overall, and rounding out the cross bike podium with an insanely badass ride was Clay Webb. Stomping it out on a single speed, this result bodes well for sweeping the intermediate category at next year's Cross on the Rocks category.

 
Scott Mitchell Photo
The Thanks
Thanks to Halldor for another year of wicked racing, to all the spectators that braved the poor weather to heckle and cheer, and to Mitch and Scotty for taking photos.

Scotty's full set of excellent photos can be found here.

Dessert Storm

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