Mountain Biking and Bobsledding in Whistler

Today I had booked a morning at the bike park to learn about how to ride trail bikes off-road. After getting kitted out in body armour and sized for a bike we set off with our instructor to load the bikes on the chairlift. Once up top we learned the importance of one finger braking, positioning on the pedals and leaning into turns. Very different from riding a traditional mountain bike but these lessons would prove invaluable later in in the day. Our first run was an ‘easy’ run with many stops where we were told how to handle the corners and the more tricky parts of the trail. It was hard work but interesting and the advice to look at what’s coming ahead rather than where you are right now came in handy more than once. On our second run we did a different variation of the same run with the instructor taking us at a faster pace. Of course this is where inexperience, complacency and over confidence come into play. We all had our moments but thankfully no one fell off. However there was a moment where we were split between a father and young son on the trail. The father was leading and going into a big right hander the kid just barreled straight on and disappeared, falling about 20 feet through the trees. Two of us jumped off our bikes and scrambled down to him – no broken bones thankfully but a nasty chest / stomach injury as he had caught himself on a big branch. Eventually his father came back but by then we had asked the bike patrol who came and got him. After that excitement we did a more technical and twisty blue run which required a lot of concentration. That was a LOT of fun. That took us up to lunchtime but was a great introduction to off road biking and if I had tackled the mountain without any training I would have for sure ended up having a few tumbles! From there is was a quick scramble to the Whistler Sliding Centre to be taken down the bobsled track – learning about how the track was built and the history of the centre was interesting as was the ins and outs of bobsled and luge/skeleton construction and the various competitions. However the best part was going down the run itself in a modified bobsled. It certainly was not a comfortable ride and I was glad for the padding on the side of the sled as we went down however it was an exhilarating experience and one that I would highly recommend. It was hard to believe that it was now 4pm and I wondered where the day had gone! Nick picked me up and we took the dogs for a walk in Meadow Valley Park. A quick turnaround at the apartment and it was out for a nice dinner at The Keg followed by an evening watching Fin de Fiesta perform Flamenco at the Performing Arts Centre.