Submitted by the champ himself, Lars Tribus...
2011 has been a crazy year. I've been busy racing BMX with the boys, and watching my 4 year old chase a State Championship title is super fun.
Over the last few weeks, I've been able to get back on the bike in a race environment. It feels great. I raced the first Diablo race, mostly to test some tires and just get on my bike and push myself.
Two weeks later, we went up to Windham Mountain, where I hosted a charity race for the Arthritis Foundation. It was a big success. The vibe was outstanding and we raised over $1000 bucks just from that race. It's not huge dollars, but the upcoming events will be much bigger. This is just starting. It was very cool to see one of my lifelong sponsors, Deity, support the event too. Huge thanks go to Dan and Deiter from Gravity East for making that event possible. Big thanks also to Windham mountain and USA cycling for agreeing to take $0 from the entry fees for the charity race... all the money from the entry fees went to the Arthritis Foundation.
One week after that, I was off to Brazil. I was the only American to attend the Masters World Championships this year.
The event was held in Balneario Camborio, Brazil. Word on the street is that there will be another World Cup there in 2012, as well as one more Masters World Championship, before it heads off to South Africa (rumor has it, anyway).
Being the only American to attend, I felt obligated to win the rainbow stripes. I also have come within one second of winning the Masters Worlds four times, so I admittedly was a little sick of second place at this event.
The place is SICK!! My hotel was right in the city... but fifty meters from the beach. The beach has these little huts that sell beers and make mixed drinks, so it's easy to forget what you went there for. My hotel had an indoor go-cart track right next door. I'm talking five meters away...and they were pretty dope carts....super fun. Five blocks from the hotel is the gondola. The gondola brings you up over the inlet, to the top of a small mountain (where the DH starts) and down the other side to a super rad little beach village with walking streets, shops and restaurants. It's actually an awesome place to bring a family, or friends, and they will be pumped because there's tons to do (not like a dirt parking lot in a small mountain town). There are rope courses, beaches, surfing, whale watching, boat rides, a mountain coaster... etc etc.
Qualifiers went ok. It rained all week so the course was very muddy, and SUPER slippery. It's mostly clay, so when it's wet, it's SLICK! Then it piled up in spots with axle deep ruts (no joke, like fork legs and BB's were dragging you to a stop if you rode in some of the lines.) There were lots of roots, and rocks and some short but gnarly pedalling sections (like a little uphill into rocks that ya just had to dig for).
I rode my best in years in the qualifiers. I trained with Sebastian Vasquez, from Chile, for the first day, and rode the second day in the rain alone. It was really muddy and I found my happy place. I felt like the old me in quallies, absolutely confident, and riding better than I have in a few years. My body was actually listening to my brain... then I got completely thumped. I hit the ground so hard from ten feet up... it blew. I gimped my brokenness up, and finished the run. Somehow I was still barely in first at the end of the day, and there were only a small group of riders that seemed to put together decent runs.
Race day came, it rained all morning, and then got very sunny and windy. This made the course peanut buttery, and muddy, and some little dry sections popped up in the open spots. Anyway, I rode a clean, safe run. I was pretty confident that I didn't need to roll any dice, so I rode two tech sections safe and slow, and rode the rest smooth and well. I ended up winning by eleven seconds! I am stoked to come home with another Masters Jersey. I am proud, and overall, pleased with how I rode.
In addition to that, I did three different TV interviews for Brazilian national TV. Pretty cool! Its a big country. I also did a lengthy interview for a weekly TV show in Brazil that airs on ESPN. The show is called Two Wheeled World. It's all about moto, BMX, Mountain bikes etc...and the producer was a fan of Don's early Chain Reaction videos where we were riding pit bikes etc. So we did a lengthy interview prior to the race and a good follow up after the win...he told me I will be a big part of an episode! Pretty cool stuff! SO FUN!
What a great weekend!