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Three Kelowna roommates went big at this year's Crankworx mountain biking competition in Whistler, taking home two first place trophies to put on their shared mantle.
Brett Rheeder took to the Red Bull Joyride course this past Sunday, the final competition of Crankworx, and threw down a flawless run.
Joyride takes place at the base of the Whistler Mountain Bike Park in the “Boneyard,” a giant slopestyle course where competitors perform tricks over massive dirt jumps, a log “cannon” and several giant drops.
Points are awarded based on the difficulty of the run and style.
The Crankworx-concluding competition is described by organizers as the most challenging event on the Freeride Mountain Bike circuit.
“It's like the pinnacle of the sport,” Rheeder said from his annual post-Crankworx vacation in Tofino. “It's like our Super Bowl.”
Rheeder scored an overall score of 93.00 points on the Joyride course, taking top spot over Belgian Thomas Genon (91.20 points) and Swede Max Fredriksson (89.80 points).
The announcers were more than impressed with Rheeder's run.
“So perfect, this is ridiculous,” he said. “He tapped into that inner ninja that everyone talks about he has.”
Rheeder has previously competed at Joyride three times, placing fourth, second and 16th last year when he crashed on both of his runs.
Despite his multiple years of competing, he says it never gets easier when standing at the top of the course.
“It's like the worst thing ever,” he said. “There's no way to mentally prepare yourself for that contest.
“There's so many people, there's the prize money, there's the bragging rights, you can't win a better contest so there's lots of personal pressure that everyone has on themselves.”
In spite of the pressure, Rheeder knew he had put the practice in, and was confident in his abilities.
“Here goes nothing, I'll either land it and get to the bottom or I'll crash and I'll have to try it on my second run,” he said.
But unlike 2015, Rheeder didn't crash. He put in a flawless run right out of the gate, and walked away with a cool $25,000 for the win.
Rheeder grew up in Ontario, and has ridden bikes all his life. He turned professional in 2010, at just 17-years-old.
He has only recently moved west, where he now lives temporarily with Tom and Bas Van Steenbergen, two professional mountain bikers who also competed at Crankworx this year.
Rheeder recently bought an acreage in Vernon, where he is building a house and a bike course that will be “the perfect training grounds.”
While he is looking forward to getting his own place finished, life isn't so bad with the Van Steenbergen brothers.
“We basically just wake up and go ride cross-country up in Crawford trails, and then go to Silver Star and then ride slopestyle in the evening,” Rheeder said. “It's pretty amazing.”
Bas and Tom had their own success this year at Crankworx.
Bas took the top spot in the Fox Air DH downhill competition, one of the longest running events at Crankworx, which took place on Whistler's famous 'A-Line' downhill track on Aug. 17.
Hundreds of riders flew down the course, one-by-one, soaring over tabletop jumps and careening through berms, racing for the fastest time to the bottom.
Bas snagged the best time of all competitors, at 4:04.02, a full 0.99 seconds faster than the second place finisher, Great Britain's Harry Heath.
Additionally, Bas came in third place in the GIANT Dual Slalom event.
Bas's brother and roommate, Tom, landed the first ever double-backflip in the history of the Dual Speed and Style event, garnering a perfect 100 score on his third and final run of the competition. Since the overall score in the event is an average of all runs, Tom ended with an overall third place finish.
Now that Rheeder has won the Super Bowl of his sport, he has no plans to slow down.
“There's another big contest in Utah called Red Bull Rampage,” he said. “That's in the beginning of October so from now until then I'll be back in Kelowna riding my downhill bike.”
