An Amateur View of Wisconsin

Yes. The Pros were there, but everyone covers that!


Non-pro riders started to accumulate on Wednesday the
12th for the weekend at Alpine Valley Resort in
Wisconsin. It was the second stop on the NORBA
National 2002 tour and a great break for mid-western
riders who wouldn't usually be able to make a national
event.With set practice schedules intertwined with the
events, riders readied themselves to get in as many
practice runs as possible. And ready they had to be.
There was no shuttle and we were designated parking by
the main entrance at the top of a hill. I guess the
resort figured if you ride you can hack the climb back
to your gear; the golfers that had the prime parking
at the bottom of the hill by the resort obviously
couldn't. Anyway, if they didn't already, riders
would realize just how valuable practice was going to
be when they hopped off the chair lift and glimpsed
the chute at the top of the expert downhill. Steep.
Ruts.
But dual slalom was the first focus. Qualifying runs
began at 10:00am on Thursday for the Beginners, Sport
and Junior followed by the Experts at noon. Finals
started at one. BMX riders seemed to have the
advantage on the tightly packed course. And word on
the hill was that the blue course was faster if you
could hold on to the second set of burms. Scattered
showers added to the excitement of qualifying making
the runs a slimy mess, but the sun came back out and
shone on those that rode in the finals. Pictured
rider Mike Roberts 1252 took second for the expert men
30-39. Joe Bell notorious for his desire to jump
shows his stuff at the DS finish line. (Joe also took
third place for the expert 30-39 DH.
Up the hill.


Down the hill. After a quick turn out of the gate,
the chute for the expert and pro DH slammed riders
into reality and in some cases slammed the reality out
of them. Trust me. I was there. I saw. Once past
the mountain goat section a long raging decent over
three evenly spaced water breaks took you right to a
double. The crowd formed there looking for a show.
Some showed. Some didnt. Up an incline and dropping
into the woods riders found a teepee of trees to jump.
Or not. Nice. See photo. A couple more minor logs
and rocks and into a clearing. Next time the welcome
into the woods was a rock section, the first of two.
Some tight trees and turns and out into another fast
clearing. The finishing section was a fast entrance
into another group of trees with a hard left turn down
a boulder bed. From there it was a few more tight
trees and out to end at the bottom of the slalom
course.


In all, a good time.

And I got a picture with Brian Lopes.

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