After seven days of riding, Neal Kindree and Wendy Simms have taken the titles of BC Bike Race (BCBR) Champions.
The pair were the fastest competitors in the men's and women's Open Epic category.
Kindree won the overall title with only nine seconds to spare over the course of the seven days. The Squamish resident placed third in the final stage at Whistler, more than three minutes behind stage winner Chris Sheppard. The American rider finished well ahead of second place Whistler stage finisher Cory Wallace in the final race of the series.
Barry Wicks placed third overall behind Kindree and Sheppard over the seven stages.
Kindree suffered a flat tire on the Whistler course and he said it took him about three minutes to get the tire inflated. After the race he said he felt comfortable saying that the flat tire cost him the stage victory.
"Chris Sheppard was driving it really hard up the climbs," Kindree said at Whistler Olympic Plaza after claiming his bronze medal for the third place stage finish. "I know he was trying to drop me but that was not going to happen."
The day before in Squamish there was a sprint finish and Kindree said he would have sprinted with Sheppard to the finish in Whistler if they were together at the line.
Kindree, Sheppard and Wicks battled all week for leads. Wicks gave too much in the early days of the race, in Kindree's opinion.
"I haven't talked to him but I think he may have pushed a little too hard early on and popped later in the week," said Kindree.
The top Whistler rider in the men's solo race was Michael Robinson, who finished 10th out of 119 athletes in 18:11:34.
Simms finished the seventh stage in Whistler with a win to take a clean sweep of each stage. Melinda Jackson of Australia finished eighth in the stage but second overall behind Simms.
Hannah Thorne of New Zealand placed second in the stage and third overall while Alex Robinette was the third female across the Whistler finish line. The top Whistler racer was Fanny Paquette, who placed seventh out of 15 finishers in 24:45:19.
Andreas Hestler, the BCBR Director of Marketing, said the race is a summer camp for adults.
According to the former Olympic mountain bike rider, the 2012 event sold out and registration for next year is already at 300 with 525 representing the maximum number of participants the event can handle.
"For us the big thing was having 33 countries," said Hestler.
He said people come all over the world to ride the internationally recognized single-track trails in B.C. Once they get here and the event is underway, Hestler noted that there's much work to move the more than 500 participants from stage to stage.
"It is a logistic ordeal getting 500 people onto the busses, over to Cumberland then getting them onto the ferries and feeding them and setting up about 250 tents a night, the start coral has to be set up and removed, leapfrog technique," Hestler said as he described the lengths the BCBR staff members go to in order for the event to happen.
The 2013 event is scheduled to start June 29 and Hestler said registration remains open.
Results:
Solo Men
1. Neal Kindree — 16:15:52
2. Chris Sheppard — 16:16:07
3. Barry Wicks — 16:34:44
4. Matt Hadley — 17:07:54
5. Cory Wallace — 17:08:38
Solo Women
1. Wendy Simms — 20:25:12
2. Melinda Jackson — 22:55:18
3. Hannah Thorne — 23:16:38
4. Sonya Looney — 23:44:05
5. Pam Frentzel-Beyme — 24:18:31
Solo Masters Men, Epic Distance
1. Mannie Heymans — 18:06:02
2. Chad Forrest — 19:51:20
3. Craig Gillett — 20:03:34
4. Chris Birch — 20:52:31
5. Al Killick — 21:08:51
Solo Masters Women, Epic Distance
1. Kimberley Beck — 26:52:31
2. Tricia Davis — 28:34:31
3. Roberta Wilson — 31:08:57
4. Robin Nadig — 33:39:27
5. Cindy Garvin — 37:57:26
Teams of 2, Men, Epic Distance
1. Thomas Turner, Jason Sager — 17:06:54
2. Kevin Calhoun, Keith Stark — 17:43:22
3. Colin Kerr, Greg Day — 17:57:55
4. Garett and Jake Heitman — 20:07:29
5. Michael Colwill, Scott Martin — 20:23:25
Teams of 2, Women
1. Kimberly Ridgeway, Ann Blair — 30:29:10
2. Maureen Rupert, Pam Heatherington — 31:28:56
3. Star Affolter, Grace Ragland — 34:03:28
4. Belinda Brooks, Cindy Morgan — 35:53:54
5. Susam Holm, Pam Hauck — 36:31:32
Teams of 2, Mixed
1. Jim Salusbury, Megan Rose — 22:47:54
2. Francois-Charles and Isabelle Dumas — 25:12:26
3. Tania Radic, Patricio Fernandez — 27:20:34
4. Nadia and Pascal Pepin — 28:03:24
5. Amanda Mitchell, Steven Scott — 28:12:27
Teams of 2 Veterans 80
1. Andrew and Matthew Handford — 19:59:47
2. Paul Reinis, Simon Dove — 21:12:14
3. Matt Germon, Jay Provencher — 22:40:08
4. Trevor Williams, Gerry Day — 23:48:41
5. Scotty Aitken, Ian Kennedy — 24:06:28
Teams of 2 Veterans 100
1. Bernie Shiao, Paul Stahman — 23:41:42
2. Jeff Doss, Randall Toltzman — 25:21:15
3. Robert Schorn, Steve Cullinan — 26:54:48
4. Kim Berg, Steen Hoppe — 28:18:43
5. Lothar Schaer, Beat Kowaleff — 28:23:37
Epic Distance results only. For the Challenge Distance results visit www.bcbikerace.com.
