As normal as it's gonna get. Round #6 Whistler B.C.

This year I headed straight up to BC after the EWS in Colorado finished up. It is the longest period of time that I've ever spent over in Whistler. It was great. It was long enough to settle into a daily routine, a little glimpse into a normal life, a reminder of my life back in NZ and a reminder of how much I look forward to getting back home in a few weeks.

Hannah Barnes & I rented a little condo, out of the village, in close proximity to the grocery store, yoga studio, lost lake, the green mustache and of course Mt Currie coffee shop. Bliss. We cooked in for most meals and all dinners, bought a 1 month yoga pass and abused it - definitely got our money's worth there, going every single day and dragging our fellow mtb temporary residents along with us. We drank white wine while watching chic flicks, went on a paddle board date night with Seb Kemp, Tara & their dog (without knowing), Sunday market, xc rides, early morning, mid day, apres ride and evening swims in the lake. We spent copious amounts of money at the green moustache - Buddah bowls & $8 smoothies was just a daily occurrence. You become numb to the prices after a while and just give in to spending heaps. Of course we had shopping days too and yes, of course - the reason we were here in the first place was round #6 of the EWS tour. We had an enduro race to race. I knew it would be a big one, but just how big was still a distant memory, and for now we were just savoring our new normal routine life - something you don't quite come across living out of a bag on the road.

I was super excited about all the new tracks, all the hard work that went into creating these new, secret tracks and reviving old, tired tracks. Practice was super fun. We just went for a pedal and rode new tracks. They were hard, technical, challenging, scary, but fun and definitely a good challenge. To access most of them, we had quite a pedal, and finding that balance between riding them enough to race and riding too much to be knackered come race day is always hard to find. I opted to ride all the stages once, except for the last one as that was easy to access by chair lift. Due to their very technical nature, I would have liked to ride them more, as they were more like dh tracks where you really had to have all your lines dialed or else. In the end, I didn't, and just got on with it.

I don't feel like harping on things in the past, so I won't say much, but I will say that I wish we had more time and that the day wasn't so rushed. There has been a lot of complaining, and I feel that if we just had some more time, all of those complaints could have been avoided. We're all up for big days out, not opposed to pedaling or riding technical tracks. It was just a combination of short liaison times, in really high temperatures that didn't really offer anyone to recover and compose themselves for more than 10min before dropping into a pretty full on stage. Maybe 2 days would have been better? Or one less stage, to avoid that rushed, stressed out feeling for the entire day? Running stage 4 earlier in the day before we were all toast? Who knows, but I do know that I loved the stages during practice and didn't mind the climbs, but when I had to do all of the above under such a rushed environment, in that heat, it didn't really make for a very enjoyable day.

Anyhow, I still had a blast - its Whistler how can you not? I went back after the race and rode those tracks, they were amazing - amazingly scary! They challenged me, I conquered some obstacles, felt like I progressed my riding, discovered new trails. I may not have got the result I was hoping for, but I made all my liaison stages (with not much time to spare), I rode some scary shit, nailed some lines, completely messed up most of them, fumbled, stumbled, bonded, cried, laughed and survived a pretty tough day on the bike. Hats off to all the girls that raced this one & survived. My poor bike feels completely clapped out after 3 weeks of Whistler schralping, but nothing a little TLC can't fix.

And that was all just in the 2 weeks leading up to Crankworx…the actual festival week is a complete mind f@$k consisting of people, places, schedules, parties, badges, buttons, lanyards, passes, stamps, booze etc.

just some of my highlights:

• Going on a scavenger hunt in Lost Lake with Seb Kemp & the kids that he coaches - remarkable future generation - it restored my faith in the next generation. (and being taught how to ride a teeter totter by a 7 year old).

• Stand Up Paddle boarding & watching Seb get ejected off his board by his dog. (Not sure i'm keen to make SUP a hobby of mine).

• SRAM Women's riding clinics that Rebecca Rusch organizes every year & coaching with so many other inspirational women.

• yoga (some great, some not so great - "say hello to your cells" WTF?).

• Filming for Juliana Bicycles with Seb, Dan & Andy from the Union Production Co.

• Sven's new Bike Magazine cover

• Gary Perkin Photo shoots with fellow Juliana teamies Katrina Strand & Kathy Pruitt (& the Santa Cruz boys).

• Seeing the SRAM videos for the first time on the big screen that we filmed months ago in NZ with my buddy Sarah Leishman, Ross Measures & the MindSpark Cinema Production company. SO Sick.

• Fishing with Joe Parkin in the gondola.

http://www.bikemag.com/videos/video-fishing-joe-crankworx-ep-2-featuring-sven-anka-martin/#.U_Q48ZJwRTI.email

• IKAM magazine.

• Mama & baby bear encounter with Gabby Molloy. HA ha ha!

• The SRAM pop up shop was mind blowing - INSANE! LOVE #theguidetogettinglost

• Pemberton Tacos! SUSHI.

• Meeting new peeps & catching up with old one's - making current plans & planning for future adventures.

It was time to leave today. My bank account is probably in over draft, I'm too scared to check. I'm yearning for the old world and a slower pace of life. I'm looking forward to cheaper food, small espresso's, red wine & quiet time. Time to reflect on the crazy season that its turned out to be and to digest it all, process everything and then decide what I'd like to do with it. I feel the need to press my reset button, to slow down and get ready for the absolute highlight of my year and season - the Trans Provence.

Thank you & cheers to every single person that made the North American leg so much fun - you all know who you are. Till we meet again in a few weeks for pizza, gelato & more wine of course ;)

Peace out,
Anka

EWS round #1 Nevados de Chillan, Chile: Ja, ja, ja, ja, ja! Vamos, vamos, vamos!!!!!

O Chile, how you have crept deep into my heart as quite the special place. From never setting foot on South American soil, to going over to Chile twice in the past 2 months has been quite the new love affair for me. Of course the first time around, everything is always a bit strange, or different and it takes you a while to find your feet in any new country, but then the second time around, those things you thought were a bit strange end up being the things you love about a new country. The first thing that struck me about Chile in February when we went out there for the Andes Pacifica race was the hospitality of the people and their pride of their country. This time around, this notion was again confirmed by spending some more time with this passionate nation, ready to approach, embrace and engage at any time, place or moment. They are truly a warm nation and that is what made this first round of the Enduro World Series in Nevados de Chillan so very special.

The fact that the tracks were absolutely amazing, the dirt – hero like no other, the scenery, simply spectacular and father Fall didn’t hold back in providing some extra spectacular changing fall colours to keep the photographers very happy indeed. The weather couldn’t have been more perfect; crisp, chilly mornings and evenings, which made for brilliant blue-sky days and the perfect temperature for riding bikes. Quite a difference from 6 weeks ago when we were suffering in the Andes mountains with not a tree in sight and temperatures souring well up into the 40 degree Celsius mark for the Andes Pacifico.

We had two days of practice, or riding, where we could practice the first three stages of day 1 and then the next three stages of day two the following day. They were full, long days of riding and it was brilliant. These two days gave us time to catch up with friends we haven’t seen since last season, to check out everyone’s new shiny bikes and bright coloured kits, to ride together, to scope out lines together and to revel in the spectacular scenery whilst hike a biking together. Yes, it was the first round of the EWS, but the two practice days felt like we were all just in one pretty cool place riding pretty amazing new tracks together. After these two days, you could feel all the hiking in your legs and your body felt like it’s been doing something; it was now time to race and repeat the past two days, just in a more serious matter I suppose, and without stopping to high five with your mates every few minutes.

You could definitely sense a bit of nervousness at the start of the first stage; this was it, the season opener and this was when your silly brain would take over with thoughts such as; did I train enough or in my case, did I ride enough? Maybe I should have done some intervals and skipped the berry ice cream and beer after every ride this summer; they look skinny, they must be super fit…blah, blah, blah, the brain wanting to pull you out of your confidence zone and into your doubting zone. Fuck it, not much you can do about anything now, just go and ride your bike, have fun with it and see what happens hey. My goal for this first round was to not crash & get over excited like I did in the opener last year in Punta Ala, just ease into it, steady as, get rid of the nerves and finish the weekend with a top 10. That would be ideal and I managed to do just that.

Day 1:

Stage 1 -  Candonga: Super downhilly stage with super loose corners, shoots, berms and high-speed sections.

Stage 2 - G Del Diablo: This one had about an hour hike a bike to get to the start with a beautiful old Refugio and Alpine Beech forests with the most magical colours. It was a long and very physical stage with all the techie stuff near the bottom, long flat, sandy pedal sections and blown out loamy turns - it was a toughie.

Stage 3 - Dakar: Back up to the top of the mountain for this one; another old school downhill type track that was pretty straight down the mountain, soft, ruts, moto style until you entered the woods where it turned into the bike park with a few jumps and super fast berms to the finish line. So sick!

Day 2:

Stage 4 - Valle Hermosa: This day started off with a nice little steep hike a bike to the top of the start. It was another spectacular morning checking out the fumaroles – the steam coming out of the mountain with views to die for. It was tough to remember this stage, but it was very flowy, fast and flat towards the bottom, so much fun to start the day on.

Stage 5 - Olimpico: This one was my most dreaded one, as it was the most physical one, but also the one with the trickiest, tech sections and I never seemed to find much flow on it. Not much you can do about that, so I squished some gel into my body, ate a banana and went for it. It didn’t seem that long during the race, but there were way more flat pedal sections than I remembered and the flow; I couldn’t find much flow, but ended up being better than I thought it would be.

Stage 6 - Candado XL: I was so excited about this stage starting right at the top of the mountain in the snow with views of majestic mountains and snow covered volcanoes. So stunning. This was going to be a long one; 15 minutes or so starting off in really rough, barren, rocky, moon like terrain and ending up in the most magical, dark, loamy hero dirt of a forest with never-ending berms and steep shoots, it was so much fun! By the time I got the steepest part near the end, I was hanging and two finger braking just to make it down there and not blow it at the end.

The crowds were spectacular throughout the weekend, screaming and cheering and calling out your name as you went by. This was the general theme all weekend and it felt great. There were families and kids and competitors – amateurs and professionals, and everyone had a good vibe going. Maybe it was because it was Easter weekend, but whatever it was, it was awesome. The pit area was set up on this lush lawn area with the mountains surrounding us and no one wanted to go home. After practice people were just lounging about, enjoying the day and listening to some seriously good DJ mixes.

I was super happy ending up with an 8^th place overall for the weekend. Better than the 18^th I ended up with last year, so that’s a good start. I loved racing on my pretty new teal Juliana Roubion; she did steal a few hearts out there that’s for sure, as the ladies (and some guys) are super excited to get their hands on one of these bad boys soon.

Well done to all the pinners out there this weekend and to everyone that made the effort to go to the little ski town of Nevados de Chillan for a bike race. A big cheers to the Montenbaik crew and to everyone who made this event possible. Matias, Eduardo, Chris, Enrico, Nacho and too many others to mention.

Of course it’s all over before you know it, with a mad rush to get everything clean and packed up again and to get back to Santiago for whatever is next. We had a mad rush to get Sven to his flight the next morning with a 4am departure and a 6 hour drive, as he headed to Cairns for the next round of the World Cup and I couldn’t get on a flight for 2 days, so I had a little city layover in Santiago, exploring the city and doing some fun non bike related things, which of course included some eating (ceviche) and shopping of course.

Time for me to head home now for three weeks or so and to get everything ready for our next journey: our 5 month stint to Europe. Time to savor, appreciate & soak up everything that I so love about New Zealand and it’s beautiful forests, trails and people. The colours, the smells, the sea & the food…I already miss it, but there are more adventures waiting abroad and it’s time to go soon.