his weekend I was lucky enough to shoot the inaugural East Coast Open at Blue Mountain. Sirbikealot Racing and Blue Mountain teamed up to put on this incredible event. They built an amazing race track and offered up Canada’s largest DH race prize purse.

I got up to Blue Mountain on Friday to walk the course and get my game plan dialed. Collingwood and Blue Mountain were also hosting Elvis Fest that weekend and I though it may be fun to snap a few pics of that. I sniped a few shots from my balcony and then took a stroll through the village to get a bit flavour. These were all shot with the Nikkor 300mm f/2.8.

Fast guys pre-race chat. Look’s an awful lot like the podium on Sunday

Later that night, Peter Appleton of Sirbikealot Racing invited me up to their room for dinner. I liked the sound of a home cooked meal and though this may be a cool time to snap a few fun portraits of the guys behind the O-Cup DH races. They whipped up a killer pumkin risotto and these portraits pretty much speak for themselves. These were all shot with small strobes and my Sigma 50mm f/1.4. Was a fun night!

Kris Somers

Lee Allen

Pete Appleton

The rain that was forecasted for Saturday avoided the hill all day. We got a bit of rain overnight but not enough to make a difference. Guys were a bit tentative during practice but got comfortable on the track quickly. The light was great and I manged to get some killer shots. I shot with three SB-800s for the whole day, mostly using my Nikkor 70-200mm VRII. Blue really did an amazing job on this track.

Steve Gauci – whipped!

Harold Woolnough (Silent Devinci) shootin the bowling alley

Greg DeBoer slicing through the shale

Race day was a bit of a P.I.T.A. to shoot with spotty, harsh mid day sun for most of practice and the race. I knew Pete and Blue would want a nice finish line shot so I decided to hang in the finish line corral and hope for a nice scrub over the last jump. I also generally don’t shoot awards or podiums. Usually because I am still stuck humping down the hill with all my gear. I also find there are more subtle ways to tell the story of the race than a straight up podium shot. I was however stoked to get some post-race candids. That’s more my style!

Josh Toohill with the finish line scrub I was looking for!

Kyle Sangers in the hot seat

Harold and Rob – stoked on their blistering fast runs

Monika Luebke – Winner of the woman’s pro class

Men’s Pro Podium

The three fastest riders of the day – Harold, Rob and T.R.

I had an absolute blast shooting this event. Great people, great destination and a killer race. Track was just over 3 min long and was a great proving ground for all riders. Sirbikealot Racing and Blue Mountain did an amazing job and I am sure that next year this event will be on everyone’s must race list.

Huge thanks to Pete, Lee, Nikky, Dina, Kris, Greg, Graeme, Pete, Kit, Sarah, Jonathan and all the racers who came out to support this race. Looking forward to next year already. Full results here: http://www.ontariocycling.org/web_pages/results/66-all.htm