This past weekend while a group of us were in upstate New York at the Windham World Cup. Jared Graves, Richie Rude, and Rosara Joseph of Yeti Cycles competed in the Whistler stop of the Enduro World Series. The course in Whistler is a steep and challenging all day affair with riders commenting that by the end of the day they were just trying to get to the bottom. We can’t even begin to imagine the impact a day of riding like this would have on us mere mortals, only one word comes to mind, DEVASTATED.
Jared had some bad luck in the early on with a few mechanicals that forced him to ride cautiously through the first four stages, still he was able to remain competitive and was in 7th place heading into the final stage. The final stage however was Whistler’s famous/infamous Top of the World, a trail that starts at the top of Whistler mountain heads all the down to Whistler Village. A very long stage with a lot of room to make up time, and that is exactly what Jared did, blazing the stage with enough speed to put him on top of the box at the end of the day, this was a truly amazing performance against the worlds best enduro riders.
Rosara stayed consistent throughout the day an wound up in 5th place just 6 minutes off the pace after one hour of white-knuckle racing. She has consistently moved up in rankings throughout the season and its only a matter of time before she is battling for a spot on the top of the box.
While Richie couldn’t repeat the podium performance he had in Colorado his 16th place shows that he is learning a ton from Jared and in his first year racing the EWS he is showing that he is definitely going to be a contender in the years to come.
Photo Credit: Gary Perkin