Cross on the Rock

Newsletter #2 for 2019. MAZDA-COTR.
Season #14. The year of the dark mark.

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Bikes washed, lubed and protected for the season with Muc Off.

Welcome to the 14th season of Cross on the Rock. We are a week and a half away from our first race of the season in Cumberland on September 8th. We will be sending out our 3rd newsletter next week with a preview for that race next week. This newsletter will overview the season and some of the changes that are happening at Cross on the Rock for 2019.

Newsletter #2.
1. Cross on the Rock Season #14 Overview
2. License requirements for 2019
3. Category name changes and descriptions.
4. Teams, Clubs, Practices and Clinics.

1. Cross on the Rock Season #14 Overview

The fall schedule continues to get more and more busy! We have tried to space out the races a bit more than last year but without a double header we could not fit in 8 events for this season. All this means is the 7 we have will be even more tightly contested and you will not want to miss a single race!

September 8th. COTR #1. Coal Cross. Cumberland.

• Starting the season off this year in Cumberland. We have experiences heat and rain in Cumberland in Septembers past…..so we will see what we get this year!

September 22nd. COTR #2. Pro City GP. Victoria

• After being the first race of the series for a few years Topaz park will be the second race for 2019. With a looming park re-design the future of this amazing venue is uncertain.

October 6th. COTR #3. Cross on the Commons. Qualicum Beach

• Qualicum Beach returns for the 3rd time. Clockwise or Counter clockwise? Something entirely new? We don’t know! We can tell you that the ice cream in the village tastes great after a day of racing.

October 14th. COTR #4. Muc Off Cup. Nanaimo

• Thanksgiving Monday classic! Name change for this year but one of the best courses (and polarizing) courses around. This event has had the highest DNF rate and the lowest!

October 27th. COTR #5. Crosstoberfest (The return of). Ladysmith

• After a couple of years off COTR will return to Transfer Beach. This time for “Crosstoberfest”. Some park changes will mean some course changes. The venue and view can not be beat!

November 3rd. COTR #6. Day of Thunder. Victoria

• Back to Western Speedway for the second to last event for the 2019 season at Western Speedway. This venue has probably hosted the 3rd most cyclocross races on Vancouver Island. Lots of space. Lots of “knarly”.

November 16th. COTR #7. Hot Crossed Bunnies. Nanaimo

• Nanaimo’s Beban park will host the last race for 2019 with it’s Hot Crossed Bunnies race. Double points will be up for grabs which normally means a shake up in some of the standings right before the awards for the season are given out.

7 races.
5 Sundays
1 Monday
1 Saturday

Registration for the series and Coal Cross will open at 6:00PM tonight (links on the web site) and registration for the remaining 6 events will open next week. Registration for the SERIES will close at 6:00pm before the first event and not open again. Registration for each race will close at 6:00pm the night before the event so that we can process the start lists etc. (if you are not pre-registered you do not get a call up). There is always registration available on race day up until 30 minutes before the race OR until it reaches it’s registration limit.

PLEASE NOTE: When you are signing up for TEAMS for the FULL SEASON or for COAL Cross make sure everyone is on the same page with regards to the TEAM NAME. Signing up for the full season does not automatically put the team name into the list for Coal Cross (or any of the other races) and signing up for Coal Cross does not put the team name into the list for registering for the full season.

2. Licence Requirements for 2019

Licencing is confusing. It does not help that every year the licences change. The insurance requirements change and it all starts again…..WHICH LICENCE DO I NEED TO RACE?

So here we go. We will try to explain your options.

1) If you are only going to do a couple of COTR races (We strongly encourage you to race them all) but you don’t want to buy any license. You are racing COTR races ONLY. Pay for a Day of Race licence each time you race $10 for an adult. $5 for youth. This is OK if you are only going to race once or twice a year. But it is a PITA (paperwork etc) if you are going to race more than that!

2) Buy a “Provincial Ride Licence” from Cycling BC. $60. This works if you are racing the LAUNCH category (Beginners/Youth/Sport) races at COTR. If you are going to race 6 or more COTR events this year. This is your best bet but ONLY if you are ONLY going to race Cross on the Rock this fall. You can not race other events or the provincial championships with this licence.

3) Buy a “Provincial Race License” from Cycling BC.Adult $90. Youth $60. Get this one if you want to race COTR as well as in Vancouver and Provincial Championships. You can race any category in the province.

4) Buy a UCI license (Cost varies depending on age) if you want to race BIGGER races such as UCI races or National Championships.

Those are your current (for this year) options for Cross on the Rock for 2019

3. Category name changes and descriptions.

If you did not figure it out the theme for this year’s series is Harry Potter. We have been getting a lot of awesome feedback about the logo and theme for the year so thanks for sending that and passing it on. With that we have been working on making the categories for this season a bit more “fun”. Hopefully everyone will catch on. We are also changing the name of two of the categories (for now) to better reflect who is racing in them.

This is what we are going with for this year. You may have to look up some of these terms as we did. They were researched and suggested by Tycho and Tessa.

• Little Nutcase racers will be “First Years”. As in the “First Years race the Little Nutcase races”.
• Mazda Zoom Zoom racers will be “Goblins”
• The Beginner category will receive a name change to “Launch”. This category is a mix of youth, return to race all ages, masters “c” racers and all age beginners so it was felt that “beginners” did not really fit. Those racing the Launch category this year will be called the “Seekers”
• If you are a Boggart you will be racing the men’s intermediate category this year. That includes the older youth categories and those not ready to jump into open. We chose Boggart for this category as a boggart can change itself into ANYTHING it wants. Just as an intermediate has endless possibilities.
• Women’s Intermediate will be the “Animagi”!
• Men’s masters racers are the “wizards” and women are the “Veela”
• Super masters…..well “Professors” just fit so well!
• Rounding it out Experts will be changed to OPEN (Actually returns to open) which reflects the nature of that category with “A” level masters racers, fast JR racers and those fitter than most humans racing in this category. Those racing the Open category are of course….the Auror!

We hope this theme is fun for everyone this season. After all racing should be fun!

4. Teams, Clubs, Practices and Clinics.
Cross on the rock would like to increase our focus on Clubs and Teams to foster community and growth to cycling. If you have a club or team that races we would like to know about it and put it on our resource page on the web site.

Please send any club information to: normont@islandnet.com
We would like the following information:

1. Name of the club/team
2. Is the club OPEN (will accept new members) or CLOSED (full or have to apply)
3. Where is the primary location (ie. Victoria).
4. Age group and what the group focused on (ie. ALL AGES. or “Just hard core single speeders and vodka drinkers)
5. Contact person and contacts (FB, e-mail, IG)
6. If you have any weekly practices or groups (Carpooling, monday night barrier practice. Tuesday night close down the bar practice)
7. If you have a club that does practices or clinics let us know.

Here is a good example:

Practices:

Rock City Cycles in Nanaimo: Frst cross practice will be this Wednesday (August 28) at 6PM at the Red Barns at Beban. We will work on some basics and try to get our cross legs back!
PS, please be sure to have paid for your cycling BC license.

Clinics:
Broad Street Cycles:
Details are here: http://www.broadstcycles.ca/cyclocross-skills-weekend-clinic-sunday-sept-23rd-2/
We’re hosting another round of CYCLOCROSS SKILLS CLINICS!
– Learn the classic technique for dismounting, carrying and remounting your bike for cyclocross racing.
– Taught by coaches with many years of cyclocross experience.
– We break everything down into steps and progress methodically, focusing on technique. Then we go into race-like situations where you practice and make use of what you’ve learned!
WHEN: Wednesday evenings August 28th, and September 4th. – 6:00 reg, 6:30 start

LOCATION: 4017 Prospect Lake Road.
$10/ clinic, or $25 for three!

Cross on the Rock is an ISLAND series and the past support we have received from our island community is awesome. Lets keep it up in the future as it is what drives this series and makes it special. PLEASE SUPPORT THE SPONSORS. These are local businesses and companies that support local businesses. On-line companies, amazon, big business (besides Shimano and local dealers of MAZDA) do NOT support community events.

Cross on the Rock is organized by the council of cross and supported by a lot of bike shops and awesome people as well as Cycling BC.

Newsletter #13 for 2018. MAZDA-COTR YEAR #13

Having MAZDA as our title sponsor Mazda, makes so much more possible for COTR. Thank you!!

Don’t put your bike away until it is fully washed, checked and prepped. Fix things that are broken and use Muc Off to get your bike ready for the off season.
#COTR2019
#CROSSWASHERE
#crossontherock
#Mazdarules

While this is our FINAL newsletter for 2018 you can continue to follow us on the socials. We are constantly posting on both the Facebook and Instagram. The first newsletter for 2019 is due out in August. Until then enjoy our last newsletter for 2018.

Race and Series Maintenance Items

1) StudyBuild Youth COTR Sponsorship for 2018

Council Note first: How amazing is it to have this program the last 2 years. MAJOR thanks go out to Danielle and Andreas for doing this for our young Cross on the Rock racers.

Criteria and steps to apply:

• Participation in 7 or 8 of the 8 COTR races this season is required to qualify for funding.
• Age 19 and under racers in Beginner, Intermediate or Expert races
• Each youth racer should complete the application form in their own words (NOT their parents), to request reimbursement for race entry fees.
• Submissions will be accepted until midnight on Friday, November 30th 2018
• Study Build will mail cheques out to racers in December. Cash your cheque when you get it please, don’t save it for months!
• Link to application form: https://goo.gl/forms/aR7yndBJRAqlkkN63

2) Lost and Found. A tool kit in a red and white shopping bag (Swiss Flag) was left beside the EV/Devo tent. If anyone picked this up please tell them to get in touch and the owners will trade for much beer! Thanks.

3) THE SURVEY
Our year end survey is important to direct the future of COTR Season #14 as well as relay information to sponsors for their continued support. PLEASE take the 5 or less minutes to work through this year’s survey and give your input. We will sweeten the deal with a prize for someone in the first 100, 200 and 250 (our goal is 250) respondents. Here is a link to the 2018 survey.

Warm Ups

• Rolands on-board coverage of the Master’s Men’s Day of Thunder race. Including some amazing footage of the first lap. BONUS his coverage of BC Provincial Champs
• I saw Geoff Robson out there at the Day of Thunder….have not been able to find any photos from him yet but he did have his camera with him…..so looking forward to it. Geoff captured this memorable feature years ago at one of the early Western Speedway races.

• Here is a link to Patrick Burnham’s photos from the weekend.
• Here is a link to MAZDA’s Sean Voigt’s photos and video’s including a lot from the MAZDA ZOOM ZOOM Race.
• Nothing yet from Intertidal Creative for video. Apparently their drone crashed after 3 minutes of flight on Saturday. Thoughts and prayers for their drone.

IN THIS NEWSLETTER:
1. COTR Year #13 Review
2. The Day of Thunder Review
3. COTR Year #14 Preview

1. COTR Year #13 Review

13 years!! Well we had an amazing season. From South to North. East to West. We covered more of the island than the COTR series has ever before. All the while racing some amazing courses in some amazing places. That is all fine and good but we all know what makes this series as special as it is. The people. The racers. The sponsors. The race directors. The parents. Everyone coming together for 8 days in the fall. Working behind the scenes. Making it all work out. Without everyone making it happen it simply would not.

Next year is the 14th season! We encourage you all to return as racers. Bring someone new with you. Bring someone back that has not raced for a while. Help out at your local race. Help clean up at all the races. Be a “bigger” part of it all. Too much falls on too many most of the time so lets make year 14 the year that more people are involved with Cross on the Rock!!

Have a great off season……it is too long and then too short!

Many thanks to all our sponsor Sponsors.
Title Sponsor: Mazda who make a LOT more possible with the series including covering all the prizes for ALL the kids races.
Presenting/Prizing Sponsor: Muc Off
Sponsor for the Victoria races: Pro-Pearl Izumi-Shimano
Super Masters Men’s Category Sponsors Island Cycles
Corey and Sean from Rock City Cycles Nanaimo sponsoring the Kona Kup
Peter Crighton from Cycles Lambert/Muc OFF
Phillips Brewery for their continued support for the Single Speed category and series prizes
Frontrunners Nanaimo who let me race and organize.
Nutcase do a great job supporting the little kid races
KONA the sponsor of the Kona Kup
Trek Bikes Victoria. Pro City Cycles for the GP at Topaz
Wade Luksay Riverway Dental (Youth Category Sponsors giving CASH to these little up coming racers today)
Andreas and Danielle from Study Build from Quadra Island who are sponsoring the Youth race for FREE program
Kyle Denny from 11 Speed Coffee covering the Last Not Lapped (AKA most in need of coffee)
And Sam Wittingham from Naked Bikes….because he is SAM

SPECIAL THANKS TO our Race Directors
Scott Mitchell
Grant Leystock Key
Lee Blais
Dave Nowak and Chris Sykes
Corey and Sean from Rock City Cycles
Roy Kregosky and the Arrowsmith MTB Club
Patrick Burnham and MIVA
Drew MacKenzie, Joele Guynup and Parker Bloom

For helping with our amazing trophies.
Jamie Cameron and Paul Brend

Our stats, results and timing crew
Patrick Burnham and Roland Rabien

Website
Brett Whitehead

Congratulations to our special prize winners for the series:

Forever Young: Bill Lane. Started in 2007. Has done 47 races since. 72 years old. ALWAYS out there. Never complains. BIG SMILE. BILL LANE

Best Rookie Season: We had an amazing crop of COTR Rookies this year. It was the hardest year to decide this award and in the end it came down to the last race. Taking it home was 17 year old Hamish Graham taking 4th place overall in the EXPERT category in his first year racing COTR.

COTR Spirit AWARD– Laurie Voroney and Edwin, Bridget, Emma Booi.
Started racing in 2016 in Beginners. Doubled up with Intermediate. Raced Intermeidate. Started Maters in 2018. 3 Podiums in Masters. Doubled with Expert. Branching out by entering the Red Bull Pump track challenge. EVERYONE races from their family. EVERY time.

2. The Day of Thunder Review

Council Notes:
Drew MacKenzie not only directed the double header. Drew ALSO won the EXPERT Men’s for the 2018 SERIES! He had to kill it Saturday after working his butt off setting up the course and organizing a double header. This is pretty much an impossible task…..but he pulled it off with a 3rd place. His record 41st Podium! This was his 3rd time winning the series OVERALL for Expert (2018, 2012 and 2010). He is also the oldest Male ever to win the Expert Category for the series overall. On Monday the day after putting on 2 races, setting up and racing Drew drove the trailer up to Nanaimo from Victoria so that he could get it done before leaving the next day for work. In total…..a MASSIVE effort by Drew!!

Notes from double header race director: Drew MacKenzie

Well another awesome weekend and season of cross racing has flown by!

Even with 8 races this year and a lot of lingering sore muscles I am still sad that its over.

First and foremost, I want to express my sincerest appreciation for all of the volunteers who come out early and stay long to make the events happen!

There is literally no way to put on events of this size without the help of so many volunteers and so many other quality individuals who chip in where they see a hand being needed.

I spend most my time on race days simply running around going from one thing to the next and never really getting to spend any earnest time with all the fine folks who help out, so I really want to take this opportunity to recognize them.

I also want to take this opportunity to strongly encourage more people to volunteer moving forward. A lot of the same fine folks help out year after year and we absolutely need new people to come into the fold and help out in order to sustain this amazing series and avoid burning out our incredible regulars.

Please strongly consider volunteering if you can and please take a second to show your appreciation and thank these people for their contribution to our beloved cross community. When you see them next, give them a high five, or a beer, or heck give em a hug and say thanks for all that they do:

Specifically thank you to the following extremely fine folks:

– Norm, Wendy, Patrick, Roland and Brett for all of their hard work, inspiration and tireless dedication. Words do no justice. Thank you!
– Sylvia Storry for wrangling volunteers and running the show so effectively all the while being so positive, upbeat and so easy to work with.
– Parker Bloom for agreeing to partner with me and taking on a lot of the work to make Provincial Championships happen. Parker then ended up getting wrangled into the entire weekend of activities and essentially living at the Speedway Friday, Saturday and Sunday!
– And last but not least… and speaking of getting wrangled into stuff, a massive thank you to Joele for putting up with my shenanigans all the time. A lot of people end up thanking me for putting on races, but Joele is so instrumental to every single aspect of pulling off all the events that it would be impossible without her, and she should get way more of the blame!

COURSE SET UP AND TEAR DOWN:
Dave Podmoroff
Doug Doyle
Roland Rabien
Patrick Burnham
Terry McKall
Rob Parkin
Victoria Leeson
Steve Crowe
Scott Mitchell
Brent Hooper
Andy Pitre
Mitch Thacker
Joele Guynup
Jon Watkin
and Wendy Simms, Tessa and Tycho!

REGISTRATION
Sharon Hume
Linda Saunders
Jacinta
Betsy Mackenzie

BEGINNER PRE-RIDE/CLINIC
Victoria
Glenowyn
Denise

TIMING
Amy Errington
Sherry Barnes
Kyle
Bruce Falk
Liz
Ros

My sincerest apologies if I have missed anyone!

A massive round of THANK YOUs to everyone who contributes to this great series by chipping in where you see a hand being needed or simply just by coming out being quality individuals.

A very big thank you also to our race sponsors:
Please remember to vote with your dollars and your kind words the next time you’re out shopping or talking about bikes to friends and strangers alike. The internet does not put on events or provide prizing for all the races in your local community. Make sure to support your local businesses/shops/distributors/representatives that work hard to support the community!

Extra Event Sponsors (In addition to the series sponsors):
Shimano (bike.shimano.com/)
Pearl Izumi (www.pearlizumi.com/)
Pro Components (www.pro-bikegear.com/en-gb)
Focus Bikes (www.focus-bikes.com)

Kimberly Chen. The 2018 Winner of the GRAND PRIZE a new NAKED frameset. Congratulations!!

3. MAZDA-COTR Year #14 Preview
We try our best to post what the season looks like the next year at the end of the current year. Each year even though we post this in the newsletter we get a BUNCH of e-mails asking for dates etc. So take note! This is not 100% final BUT it is a rough estimate of how the race season will shake out in 2019 for our 14th MAZDA-COTR season.

Cross on the Rock Season #14

September

8th – Starting the season in Cumberland for the first time since 2015 with Coal Cross. WITH the early season and the longer days MAYBE we can finally pull off a race through the Waiverly Pub again on Saturday Night?

22nd – Heading back to Topaz for the Pro City G.P. COTR Race #2

The 28th of September is MOMAR (confirmed this time) and I am reluctant to put anything on that weekend as it is a heinous double.

October
6th – Cross on the Commons at Qualicum Beach?

15th – Thanksgiving Monday. This is currently in debate between Victoria (Western Speedway) and Nanaimo (Bowen Park)…..stay tuned on how this shakes out.

20th is the Tripleshot Crossfondo Day so we will leave this weekend to them!

That leaves the 27th. The closest COTR to Halloween…….I think we just HAVE to return to Psycho Cross at Lake Cowichan. They have the best podium!! We can’t not put that to use!

November

4th. Our first back to back weekend (gotta fit it in) will see us racing back in Ladysmith with Transfer Beach! A few changes to that park may have us returning to slack point for the first time since the Great Pumpkin Cross of 2011.

17th. Depending on what happens for Thanksgiving Monday and a few other irons we have in the organization fire we this will either be Victoria, Nanaimo OR possibly Shawinigan Lake.

with the 24th being the Ladysmith Cinnamon Bun Fun Run we will finish the season off on the 23rd. Again this could be either Victoria, Nanaimo or Shawinigan to finish off our 14th Cross on the Rock season.

That is roughly how the season will look. BUT at the same time a lot will depend on the feedback we receive in from the year end survey and how things shake out with available venues.

Regardless…..it will be worth showing up for!!

This is an ISLAND series and the past support we have received from our island community is awesome. Lets keep it up in the future as it is what drives this series and makes it special. PLEASE SUPPORT THE SPONSORS. These are local businesses and companies that support local businesses. On-line companies, amazon, big business (besides Shimano) do NOT support community events.

Parting Shots.

The spirit of COTR. Last year Hadrien Hudson Kam won the GRAND prize Giant bike at Cross on the Commons. He GAVE us his amazing 20″ SPAWN to give away. It took us all season to have the space/racks to bring it with us but we finally (remembered) packed it to the Day of Thunder where we found the smallest, youngest and most cute Buttcat Racer to pass the bike onto. We hope to see it back in action at COTR as soon as she can reach the pedals.

From Hung Mai Photography.

Newsletter #12 (2nd to last for this season) for 2018. COTR YEAR #13

Our title sponsor, Pacific Mazda, makes so much more possible for COTR. Thank you!!

Muc Off to get your bike ready for the BIGGEST weekend of CX in British Columbia this year!!

#CROSSISHERE #COTR2018 #crossontherock

Race and Series Maintenance Items

1) The series and team awards are coming up and we need to make sure the standings are correct (EVEN FOR ZOOM ZOOM’ers) Please double check your results from this season. Even if you aren’t in the running for an award an incorrect result could affect another racers placing.

Please check the following:

• Your name is spelled correctly for each race
• Your name isn’t missing and just your bib number is listed
• Your age is correct for each race
• Your team name is correct for each race
• If you are in a junior category, make sure none of your results appear in the senior category standings
• You can quickly see all results if you search for your name on the List of Racers: http://www.crossontherock.com/results/list-of-racers/

Please report any errors, even if you’ve already reported them, to roland@rabien.com

Go here to see how the standings look with one race dropped: http://www.crossontherock.com/php/series-results/?series=2018&of=6

2) Lost and Found. The Day of Thunder will be your LAST CHANCE this season to check the Lost and Found for your items. After that everything in that bucket will be donated. (Note…not smelly any more….we washed everything because we could not drive with that bucket in the van any more. There is a Casio watch that survived the washing machine in there too!)

3) Chips and Numbers. We WANT you to have your COTR (not Vancouver series Terry!) chip on your bike on Saturday. BUT if you are also racing SUNDAY be sure to CUT THAT CHIP OFF YOUR BIKE before you race the Provincial Championships!

Warm Ups

• Intertidal Collective’s Edit from Hot Crossed Bunnies was not ready when we posted our last newsletter. If you missed it on Facebook and have not seen it yet check it out HERE
• Have you done ALL the COTR races for 2018? Will Speedway be #8 for you? Then we have a special COTR limited edition iron-on patch for you for this year for FREE. Check at registration on Saturday to pick yours up.
• Has your ZOOM ZOOM’er done all of the races this year? We count 10 people that have! If you are one of them then we have something special for you on Sunday!
• Do you want to win a NAKED frame? Each time you raced this year your name went into the pool to draw from for a NAKED frame set. EVEN if you are a ZOOM ZOOM’er (sorry not the ‘lil nutcasers). This will be the LAST draw prize on Saturday after ALL the awards. You MUST be there to win (no advocates or stand-ins).
• We will also be giving away some special series-end draw prizes from Hotel Zed and EVOC. PLUS awesome prizes from Muc off and our other series prizes sponsors!
• SPECIAL thanks to everyone that helped out at Hot Crossed Bunnies raking and cleaning up after the race was done. MANY thanks!!

BEST feeling in the WORLD to win a hand-built NAKED frame!

IN THIS NEWSLETTER:
1. The Day of Thunder Preview
2. Provincial Championships News

1. The Day of Thunder Preview

Registration for this event will CLOSE Friday at 5:00 as normal. That is FRIDAY!! Limited day-of-race registration available but you know what that means….more $$ and no CALL UP!

Location:
Western Speedway is located just outside of Victoria in Langford @ 2207 Millstream Rd, Victoria, BC V9B 0J7. Pretty straight forward to locate using your preferred map service and lots of parking in the main lot near the Speedway. Once you turn off Millstream Road into the venue follow the signs for the Speedway which is located in the back right corner of the massive parking lot. See map below for where to park.

Venue Facilities:
See Venue Map for more details
Registration – located indoors under the grandstand.
Washrooms – there is a smaller washroom facility available on the infield near the team tent area as well as massive indoor washrooms under the grandstand near registration.

Food:
The best waffles in the business, Wannawafel will be on site serving up tasty Belgian inspired goodness.
Indecent Risotto Food Truck is also confirmed for the race, serving up breakfast, lunch and dinner!

Team Tent Area:
There will be a designated tent set up area close to food trucks and finish line area on the infield of the race track. See venue map for exact location.
Team tent space is limited. First come first serve. No parking in the Team Tent area.
Arrive before 10 AM if you want to drive onto race track, drop off tent, and then return to main lot to park. There will be no racer parking spaces available on the infield.

Event Sponsors:
A massive thanks to our extraordinary event sponsors for supplying all the race tape (so much race tape!) and a huge amount of prizing.
Shimano (bike.shimano.com/)
Pearl Izumi (www.pearlizumi.com/)
Pro Components (www.pro-bikegear.com/en-gb)

Course Description:
To keep things exciting and fresh, the series final will feature a modified version of past COTR events at Western Speedway and 2015’s SSCXWC (Single Speed Cyclocross World Championships) course with less boats, snow, shortcuts, but hopefully more mud and just as much fun!

With a wide motocross style start on dirt, a paved finish line straight away, and every other type of surface in between, the course will be a fun but technically challenging mix of slow, fast, and really slow with a number of potential on-off bike sections thrown in for good measure.

Schedule

The Awards
We will be doing awards as soon as possible after the Expert races. With Provincials the next day we will be moving through these in our usual efficient style.

First will be the awards for the Day of Thunder
Then draw prizes
THEN series awards and special awards.
THEN special draw prizes from: Hotel Zed, EVOC and finally NAKED Bikes!

2.Provincial Championships News
Registration closes: Thursday, November 15, 2018 11:59 PM (GMT-7)

Planning on checking out some high-speed, high-tension bike racing drama at the Cross on the Rock finale, and Sunday’s BC Cyclocross Provincial Championships?

Get yerself over to the registration page before it CLOSES FOREVER (Thursday 11:49pm) and you miss out on the chance to race at Western Speedway here in Victoria.

REGISTRATION: https://www.webscorer.com/register?raceid=157146

What will the course be like this weekend? Will there be a boat jump? Snow bank?

Check out the short edit Rob Parkin Video made for us back in 2015 when we hosted a party-disguised-as-a-bike-race at Western Speedway.

Event website: http://www.broadstcycles.ca/2018-bc-cx-provincial-champs/

Tech Guide is published

This is an ISLAND series and the past support we have received from our island community is awesome. Lets keep it up in the future as it is what drives this series and makes it special. PLEASE SUPPORT THE SPONSORS. These are local businesses and companies that support local businesses. On-line companies, amazon, big business (besides Shimano) do NOT support community events.

Parting Shot.

This is the way you want to feel after your race on Sunday!!

1 Race to GO! (2 if you are doing Provincials)

Newsletter #11 (3rd to last for this season) for 2018. COTR YEAR #13

How cool would it be to have a MAZDA for “CX”!!

Muc Off is the BEST way to restore your bike from the mud of Hot Crossed Bunnies and prepare it for your last training weekend of the year!

#CROSSISHERE #COTR2018 #crossontherock

Nothing makes us happier than the ‘Lil Nutcase crew! One more race ‘lil Nutcases!

Race and Series Maintenance Items

1) CHECK YOUR STANDINGS! NOW. This is important for 2 reasons. 1st is for Provincial Call up. If there is anything wrong with your standings it will effect your call up. 2nd is for YOUR results for this COTR season. With the series final coming up we like to be as accurate as possible! Don’t forget only your top 7 results count towards the final.

2) ARE YOU RACING PROVINCIALS? If you are racing Provincials as a MASTERS but normally race COTR as an “EXPERT” we need to know.

3) Riding with your friends and/or kids. We LOVE that people come and race as a group or family to Cross on the Rock. LOVE IT! One thing to ALWAYS consider though when racing with your loved ones. Please don’t block other riders progress or ride “tactics” to better your friends or loved ones position. We need to be considerate of other people’s races and if you are side by side all the way around the course it makes it VERY hard to get by.

4) Lost and Found. (Growing). the Day of Thunder will be your LAST CHANCE this season to check the Lost and Found for your items. After that everything in that smelly bucket will get washed and donated.

Warm Ups
It is NOT often…..OK…..NEVER that Cross on the Rock gets the FRONT COVER of the newspaper. So this is pretty HUGE!!

IN THIS NEWSLETTER:
1. Hot Crossed Bunnies Review
2. Provincial Championships News

1. Hot Crossed Bunnies Review

Photos from Patrick are here!!

Ready to re-live the course through Roland Rabien’s on-board action?

NUTCASE
Nutcase has been a very generous sponsor for COTR for a number of year. We had a dream a few years back to do a race where every Zoom-Zoom and Nutcase got one of their sweet bells. The problem was that Nutcase is VERY generous with their helmets for racers (little heads are the priority) so we only get a few bells each year…..so we have been saving the bells, stickers, pins and wrist bands each year so that one day we would have enough to do a sweet swag bag for our little racers. This was the year and Hot Crossed Bunnies was the event! Hope our little racers loved their packages!!

The Jump up Crew. (Last chance to do a jump up this year is the Day of Thunder)
(From a fellow Expert Women’s racer) “A shout out to the half-dozen or so intermediate women who raced again with the experts. It was really great to have them and I hope some more positive encouragement will inspire others to join and eventually maybe upgrade permanently!”

Notes from Race Director Patrick (also the president of MIVA and our chief timer).

Wow, what an event. The weather couldn’t have been any better if we’d planned for it. It was great to see so many happy smiling faces out enjoying themselves and racing hard.

I have to thank everyone from MIVA who stepped up and came out to make this such an amazing event. There are a lot of moving parts to make an event like this go off, from pounding stakes, to marshalling and repairing the course or signing people in. It was great to see so many come out and lend a hand.

A special thanks to all the members on the clubs board who worked extra hard behind the scenes making sure we had all the little details prepped and ready in the weeks leading up to the event. Thank you Shep, Kiyomi, Phil, Paul, Lorrie, Antonio and Brad.

A huge shout out goes to Sean and Corey for rallying the Rock City Cross team on Saturday to set up the course. We had over 40 people out Saturday afternoon and the course was set in less than two hours.
To have an event this large in a multi-use park requires buy in from quite a few different entities.

It was great to have Medix BC on site again and fortunate that they were much less busy than last year.

Thanks to AJs Island Grill and Georgies Pies for coming out to feed the masses.

Of course thanks to all the racers for coming out and being awesome. You’re what makes these events great.

Norm’s Notes

• How awesome was it to have Georgies Pies out to the event. The baked goods were SO GOOD after my race!!
• Muddy as heck but sunny! How often does that happen.
• Special thanks to my dad, Rollin, for hauling his heavy one day travel bag all the way from White Rock with him to help out at the event. Hard Core!!
• Great racing out there. Can’t wait for the finals!!

2.Provincial Championships News

Registration is live HERE!

Registration closes: Thursday, November 15, 2018 11:59 PM (GMT-7)

Event website: http://www.broadstcycles.ca/2018-bc-cx-provincial-champs/

Tech Guide is published

This is an ISLAND series and the past support we have received from our island community is awesome. Lets keep it up in the future as it is what drives this series and makes it special. PLEASE SUPPORT THE SPONSORS. These are local businesses and companies that support local businesses. On-line companies, amazon, big business (besides Shimano) do NOT support community events.

Parting Shot. #1.
I love this photo for the enthusiasm that Jack, Tessa and Tycho have for cheering for Wendy. When they discovered the “secret” door that opened right onto the course and are finally at the age where we did not have to worry (as much) about them taking a wrong step and hurting themselves or another rider…magic!

Parting Shot #2

That is it for this week. NEXT week will be the preview for the Day of Thunder COTR finals for 2018!!

1 Race to GO!

Newsletter #10 for 2018. COTR YEAR #13

Did you check out the MAZDA CX-9 equipped with Apple Car Play / Android Auto at Psyco Cross last Sunday. That is one do everything vehicle!!

Muc Off is the BEST way to restore your bike from the mud of Psycho Cross and prepare it for this weekend’s Hot Crossed Bunnies event.

#CROSSISHERE #COTR2018 #crossontherock

Race and Series Maintenance Items

1) The “Intended” race line. Although we look like a BIG series and we get a lot of great people out to our events COTR is still very much grass roots. As a grassroots series we will never have a fully enclosed and fully taped/barricaded course like a world cup or super prestige race. It is just not reality or practical. Most of the time our layout and set up works fine. BUT at the last 2 events we have seen that people have been taking advantage of this for their own gain. At Lumber X a line developed cutting through the supports before we rode through the mill. The intended and obvious course line was around. At Psycho cross I personally witnessed a racer cutting through the bushes and weeds to cut off the top of the Up-Down on the lower beach section of the course. Yes it was not flagged but the intended line was to complete the course the way everyone else was and go to the top. Basically these are d**k moves. We all know the way the course should go and when people choose to “interpret” the course to their own advantage it puts a downer on everyone else. We will NOT be taping or barricading the full course in the future so we will ask again for people to be a fair competitor and not a d**k.

2) Your Chip. Your responsibility.

3) Lost and Found. Getting down to the LAST chances for your lost and found items. LUCKY for you we will have a BIG table at registration this Sunday for you to check the stuff and see if you have forgotten any loved items at past events.

Warm Ups

• Tycho and Tessa (and helpers) Second to last Merchandise table this Sunday. They have last year’s COTR shirts (youth, women and men’s sizes (will update on FB)), COTR socks from this year SM and ML, COTR Hats and COTR 2013 Stickers. Cash Only. They MIGHT have a sweet challenge again like they did last year. So bring some $$ for sure!
• Roland’s On-Board from the Masters event for 3 laps. Amazing footage of the action. https://youtu.be/NJ14qKGH6ms

IN THIS NEWSLETTER:
1. Lumber X Review
2. Psycho Cross Preview
3. Provincial Championships News

1. Psycho Cross Review

We will have a survey coming out from the Town of Lake Cowichan to participants as part of our review and planning in the future. We will send it out by E-Mail and hope to get a solid response rate. Please keep an eye out for it.

Check out Terry McKall’s article in Canadian Cycling Magazine about COTR#6. We are pretty sure he was being so nice to us to try to make up for racing with a Vancouver CX chip on his bike and not the COTR one.
https://cyclingmagazine.ca/sections/ridesevents/cross-on-the-rock-psycho-cross/

Patrick’s Photos from Psycho Cross

Check out Intertidal Creative’s Edit from the event. AMAZING overhead shots.

Sean Voigt from Mazda’s shots from the race.

Norm’s Notes:

• Bob Day a councillor for the Town of Lake Cowichan started sending me notes in 2014 about having a cyclocross race. As many of you know we do all of our events with partners and we did not have a partner for that area. With Ladysmith taking a year off Grant from Cowichan Cycles asked me about putting an event on and we brought these elements all together.
• We have never had the level of support from a Town than we did from Lake Cowichan. It shows how much they want to bring recreation and sport to their beautiful area.
• Super fun course. Have not seen that level of difficulty since Shawinigan Lake COTR finals in 2015. As difficult as it was both my kids were able to get around the course in a pre ride including riding both the chutes!
• On course attractions including the fire pit, life guard, stairs aid station and LOTs of mud!!
• I absolutely LOVE courses that have lots of decision making resulting in on-off choices. This was a thinkers course!
• Also nice to see the crew from Cycles Therapy in Duncan pitch in to make this a successful event.
• Extra thanks to Bruce Falk from coming up and helping in the timing tent.

Grant’s Notes:
(No longer a first time COTR race director)

I have a few thank you’s.

1) Bob Day and the Town of Lake Cowichan for working so hard to ensure we had everything we need to host the event. I was very impressed with how helpful the town was.

2) Mark from Tall Tree Lumber + Building Supplies. Mark & Tall Tree donated the gripper material for all the bridges and boardwalks throughout the curse as well as the wood for our awesome coffin podium. Leading up to the event mark helped us with course maintenance, set up, and spent race day tearing around repairing the course and bridges. Huge shout out needed here.
http://talltreelumber.ca/
Tall Tree – Lumber + Building Supplies
Tall Tree Lumber Ltd. Your new Lumber and Building Supply store located in Chemainus, BC.
talltreelumber.ca

3) Scott at Carmanah Pizza was another stand out individual that donated many hours of his personal time as well as food to keep our volunteers happy leading up to the event. This event could not have happened without Scott’s help.
https://carmanahpizza.ca/
Pizza, Lake Cowichan, Restaurant, – Carmanah Pizza
Join us on Saturday October 13th, 2018 for our 2nd annual Cutomer Appreciation Day. A day dedicated to all of our amazing customers. There will be 2 for 1 regular size pizza, cake and balloons, door prizes and so much more.
carmanahpizza.ca

4) Lake Cowichan Community Trail Crew. As mentioned before, the town of Lake Cowichan was incredibly supportive in making this race happen. Huge thanks to the volunteer trail crew that came out to help repair the trail and get it ready for race day.

5) Other businesses that supported this event: Black and White Coffee (prizing/race day beverages), Marin bikes (prizing), Cycles Lambert (Evoc, Muc off, Michelin prizing).

6) Our incredible volunteers. There are far too many people to mention here but we owe a huge thank you to everyone that volunteered their time to make this event happen. From pre race course maintenance to race day logistics and clean up, we had a ton of help and are so thankful for everyone that came out. These events can not happen without volunteers!

Check out some of these links.

Find out about Sport Tourism and Sports in this area

If you want to cruise over to Lake Cowichan again here is a handy directory.

2. Hot Crossed Bunnies Preview

The V.I.E.X. had one of their barns burn down a couple of weeks ago. You will see it on Sunday. In the past we have actually raced through this barn. As well as the barn they had a lot of equipment destroyed in the fire. We will have a jar at registration collecting donations and will match what ever is in that jar at the end of the day.

Location is BEBAN park (not Bowen park like the Kona Kup)

With the TIME CHANGE to shorter day for Sunday we will be swapping to our more condensed schedule for the remaining 2 events. Please review.

With this coming race being the second last race of #COTR2018 we need to make sure as much is dialled in a head of time.

Beban park is a VERY active park. Please be considerate and aware of other park users while we are using this facility.

First thing to check is make sure that your series standing is correct. This is the ranking that will be used to determine start order on Saturday. The link to the current standings are here.
Just for fun (and because he can) Roland also has done up series points for the Mazda ZOOM ZOOM Half Track. There are no series prizes for this category BUT we love the zoom zoom’er and thought it would be cool to have this as well: 2018 Zoom Zoom Half Track

Parking: Beban park is HUGE. But on any given weekend there is a LOT going on. The best place to park for the race is south of the registration in the gravel lot by the golf course and tennis courts. Be aware that there is a new road access to the Steve Smith Jump park, please do not block it. IF there is no soccer on the Beban fields then that lot will also be available. The lot by the BMX track is normally under-utilized. The paved parking by the Pool and arena might be over run so it would be best to avoid those lots. Parking on the roadways or grass is strictly forbidden and will get you towed.

Team Tents: Make 100% sure your tent is staked and secured. With wind this week and in the forecast we can not have any tents becoming kites. There will be quite a bit of space for team tents (No vehicles) as marked out on the attached map. It is drop and go until we close and lock the gates around 10am. After that point you will have to carry your gear in. On the flip side the gate will be LOCKED until after the expert race so it will be carry out until that point. There will be no team vehicles inside the gate or we will run out of space for the team tents.

Registration: (Almost) Mandatory pre-registration will close like normal at 5:00pm the night before the race. In this case that will be SATURDAY NIGHT at 5:00pm. Reminder that if you choose to not pre-register you will not receive a call up. No exceptions. The call up sheets are literally done by 5:10pm the night before the race. The link to register is here.

On Sunday number pick up/license check/check in (and Tycho and Tessa’s special stand) will be located in the small red barn (refer to map). Same location we have had it in past years.

Washrooms: There are LOTS of washrooms located in Beban park. EXCEPT in the area where the race is held. The washrooms that we have used in the past that are located in the VIEX grounds are now de-funct. We will have two Port-a-potties in the corner of the gravel parking near the Team Tent area. You can also locate washrooms in almost all buildings in the park. Both arenas. Down by the artificial turf field. In the Pool. NO DIRTY BIKE SHOES OR DIRTY PEOPLE INSIDE THE BUILDINGS OR WASHROOMS. Clean yourself up BEFORE going into a public area. We want to be able to use this venue again.

Awards: Awards location will be posted at registration. The small red barn will be too small for this year and weather will play a part so we will post this on race day.

Race Course: Things are coming together for Sunday’s race. Both the weather and the course will be similar to last year’s event but with a few notable changes. With this year’s construction of the Steve Smith Bike new road access. We will make it up though. Expect a mud fest and challenging (long) course. MIVA will use all of the available barriers and every ounce of terrain to ramp up technical aspect.

Food: AJ’s Island Grill Food Truck will be on-site and ready to serve upBreakfast and Lunch. Great coffee, Gourmet burgers, wraps and all sort of deliciousnesses. This year we have also invited Georgies Pies etc. to bring her home baked wares.

Post race: We will want to get the awards going as soon as possible on Sunday. With that in mind please help us both tear down as well as RAKE out the course. With the rain in the forecast the more raking we can do the better the course will look on Monday when people are driving by or walking through. Please bring a rake and work gloves. Many hands make light work and get the work done FAST. We will make an announcement when we are starting the awards….and…..well…..there will be no one left on course so you will notice that the awards have started!

Considering there will be some adjustments and tweaks….but here is a GENERAL outline for the course and venue for Hot Crossed Bunnies.

Bowen Park has the longest history of any venue and course on Vancouver Island. In January of 2004 we hosted the first ever cx race north of Victoria in preparations for Wendy Simm’s first trip to CX World Championships. It was won by Robin Dutton. In November of 2004 we hosted the first ever official and insured cx race on Vancouver Island in Beban park. The course started and finished on an old stock car track that still existed in Beban park at the time called the Grandview Bowl. It was an amazing facility for cycling at the time. The race was actually quite well attended. The winner of the main events were Wendy Simms and Andrew Pinfold who went on to race for a number of road teams including Symetrics. In 2005 Beban park hosted the last race of the first ever Provincial Cyclocross series (which we started). In 2006 Beban Park hosted the Canadian Cyclocross Championships. The only Canadian Championships (Non track and non-masters) to be held on Vancouver Island (not 100% on that stat but I think it might be true?). Since 2006 Beban has been used almost ever single year of Cross on the Rock with the exception of 2 making it the longest standing and most used Cyclocross venue on Vancouver Island and in BC.

3.Provincial Championships News

Full race day schedule posted on the web page linked a few lines down and the Tech Guide coming soon.

Registration is live HERE!

There will be limited ‘day-of’ registration at the venue. All racers who register ‘day-of’ will not receive a call-up, and start towards the back of their respective start grid.

Registration closes: Thursday, November 15, 2018 11:59 PM (GMT-7)

Event website: http://www.broadstcycles.ca/2018-bc-cx-provincial-champs/

Cycling BC Cyclocross Provincial Championship Call-up procedure

1. Start grid make up
1.1 Start grid will be UCI compliant 8 riders wide.
1.2 Grid positions will be allocated to each region based on 2017 event participation numbers.
1.3 Grid position will then be assigned to riders based on their regional ranking.
1.4 3 spots on the first row of the grid will be reserved for 2017 Provincial Championship podium.

2. Rankings
2.1 Each region (Island, Lower Mainland & Interior) will be responsible for reporting their regional ranking to Cycling BC one week before the Provincial Championship race date.
2.2 Cycling BC will publish the start grid 48 hours before race start. Available on Cyclingbc.net, facebook etc.
2.3 The #1 ranked rider in each region will be assigned to top grid positions and so on.
2.4 Only riders competing in the upper most competitive categories will be included. In other words, only riders in Expert, A group, Elite, Master A etc are counted. For example, if you are a men’s master 30-39 but competing in novice, intermediate, or master B you will not be included and will be assigned a grid position at random at the back. On the other hand, a Cat 3 racer who races the whole season in Elite/Expert will earn their rank in the Elite category.
2.5 Masters 30-39 racers competing in the uppermost race categories will be assigned grid position based on their rank as it relates to other 30-39 racers. For example, if you are ranked 10th in LMCX, but riders ranked 1st through 9th are licensed elite/juniors etc., the you are effectively ranked 1st in 30-39 in your region.
2.6 If a rider is ranked in two or more series, the higher rank will be used. For example, if a rider is ranked 2nd in interior cross rankings but ranked 10th in LMCX, they will be assigned grid position ICX #2.
2.7 If a rider races in a category that is not their own as designated on their license they forfeit their call up position in their licensed category at Provincials. For example, if a master racer “races up” in Elite/Expert, they do not receive a grid position in masters.
2.7.1 An exception for call up rule 2.7 will be made for Junior and Youth racers racing up in Elite/Expert and earning a rank in the top 20% of riders
2.8 Riders from outside BC with no ranking are not assigned a start grid position.

This is an ISLAND series and the past support we have received from our island community is awesome. Lets keep it up in the future as it is what drives this series and makes it special. PLEASE SUPPORT THE SPONSORS. These are local businesses and companies that support local businesses. On-line companies, amazon, big business (besides Shimano) do NOT support community events.

Parting shot….yeah that is a hole where Norm’s leg should be.