Pila, Italy
What does a 400 Euro Italian X-Ray from Val di Sole get you? Misinformation. Kids, get your health insurance when you travel and ride bikes. Thankfully Mark is well experienced in this field, and was well prepared. Prepared to find out more information when pain and swelling didn’t go away after 5 days. Thankfully there were some great specialists in Aosta who found a fracture in Mark’s right thumb. Bitter sweet news. Good to know the problem, and another opportunity for Mark and Darren to get creative with splits made out of spoon.
The Aosta Valley was shockingly beautiful, and the crew spent more time exploring what the Italian Alps had to offer rather than indulging in the rest we all needed. While Jon, Aeden, Darren and I did some epic alpine bike rides, Mark proved to us in Pila that he is also excellent at hiking mountains when he cannot ride his bike. With his broken distal phalanx in tow, he spent the week in Pila exploring the mountains he couldn’t ride.
The team had to bid ‘Ciao’ to Aedan after Pila, as he had to head back to the We Are One HQ in Kamloops for other filming duties; and we carried on to Les Gets a week early to test and rest before the race.
Les Gets, France
Rest for Jon looked like, wet, slippery and totally fun bike park laps in Les Gets, super Morzine, Plenty, Chatel and Champery. Rest for Mark looked like, watching the office and getting on his Downhill bike a day before Track Walk. Our agreement was for him to be at 80% of his grip strength before he could attempt to ride. Mark Perseverance Wallace.
Track Walk - 03/07/2024
The moisture in the early days of a Haute Savoie summer, settled ever so happily on track. Even with a few days of sun there was no dust to be found on track walk.
Conversations about the track sounded like, “Think that will rut in?” and “Maybe it’ll be a weekend for spikes?.” Last year in 2023, Jon was on the podium here and Mark finished 16th, so between the two of them they had lots to discuss and mull over, especially with the wet conditions.
Practice Day -04/07/2024
As I watched Darren build a modified grip for Mark’s thumb using the Kaizen Foam from his tool box, the lyrics of Curtis Mayfield’s Move on Up, effortlessly became the soundtrack of that moment:
“Just move on up Towards your destination Though you may find, from time to time Complication Move on up And keep on wishin' Remember your dream is your only scheme So keep on pushin'“
“After the semi finals crash in Val di Sole I spent the 2 weeks off hoping my hand would feel good enough to race Les Gets. After doing a quick test ride Tuesday it was not looking promising. We decided to add some soft foam to my grip and cut a mold for my thumb to rest in. This worked better than we thought and gave us some hope for practice day! After the first run we knew it was good enough to give it what we had for the weekend. It wasn't great, or comfortable or very much fun but it was good enough and sometimes that's all that's needed.
Like many of the previous races this year we had a drying track all day. Things started off really slippery and there was enough mud that bikes had to be washed between runs. By the end of the day, things started to dry out nicely. As the speeds increased and the ruts cut in the soft mud started to turn into hard pack clay. I opted to raise my bars 5mm to feel a bit more comfortable in the steep sections and through the big holes in the faster parts of the track. This week I rode a new frame with more layers of carbon in the downtube to stiffen the front triangle. Although it can mean a slightly harsher ride feel the bike was more predictable through compressions and felt like it carried speed more efficiently. The flex was also more equal between the front and rear centre of the frame, it was exactly what we had asked for from the engineers at We Are One and it was great to get it on a racetrack like Les Gets in wet and dry (ish) conditions! This will be the new layup we use for future frames the rest of this season before doing more testing to make sure we get the layup perfect for the production bike.”
Qualifying Day - 05/07/2024
The Last elite man to take his qualifying run had a crash that required a Heli Evac; which caused an hour long delay in start times. Jon was the first Junior to drop after the delay, and his run proved to us that the process he is building is helping him find success; that, and he is just plain fast.
P - 3 (3:35.195 + 4.179).
“Qualifying day (which turned out to be finals day) worked out pretty good! I ended up P3 with a solid run especially after some delays that left riders waiting at the top for an hour and some minutes. Usually this wouldn’t be the biggest deal but since I was going first, nerves were high. Once I heard the helicopter take off, I hopped on the trainer, did 1 interval followed by some reaction time stuff and then went up and dropped right in. Usually, my warm up takes about 35 minutes, but we were up there for more than an hour, but I am super happy it worked! All in all I’m really happy with how things are going, the team is strong, bike keeps improving and with that, so am I. I’m very excited for what the rest of the season holds!”
Mark had two excellent runs for a man with a broken thumb. Between the modifications to his grip and bike set up, he really dug deep to lay it on the line.
Qualifying: P - 38 (3:37.255 +10.031)
Semi-Finals: P - 40 (3:34.168 +9.846)
Finals - 06/07/2024
WB, the UCI and the Local Organizers of the event cancelled the junior finals on Saturday due to a severe weather warning. There has been a plethora of weather related safety issues in and around the area, and for the safety of everyone involved (athletes, marshals, staff, volunteers, spectators, etc) They chose to cancel the junior finals; which meant qualifying results count for the podium. Jon was eating his avocado toast and fruit smoothie in the morning, in his race kit, when we heard the news. His initial reaction was sheer upset and disappointment that he couldn’t race. He would be guaranteed the 3rd place podium as they count qualifying points for finals in this circumstance.
His reaction shows just how much Jon wants to be here. He was ready and fired up to put down another run even with the impending rain storm. We commend his perseverance and determination to race in any circumstance. We are just as proud of that as we are of his third place qualifying run!
Quincy Jones once said that “Excellence isn’t an act, it’s a habit.”
We believe that all habits take time to actualize, and after this fifth world cup race the team feels closer to cultivating, what we define as excellence; both on and off the race track. With the support from the excellent engineers and staff at WR1, we are well on our way after round 5.
We shall continue to persevere!
The next world cup is in Loudenville, France in September. Until then we’ve got Crankworx Whistler, Canadian Nationals and World Championships in Andorra.
Thank you for all your support throughout these past 5 races, and an extra shout out to Linda, Cindy, Torge, Kayla and Jillian for bringing the stoke and some heart from home to Les Gets this year!
Until Nationals,
Mark, Jon, Darren and Holly