Pinnacle to step up in intensity this week with gravity-fed races

“Armor is encouraged”

The Pinnacle Race series ramps up the action with two races offered on Thursday, July 29.

 This week is dedicated to the gravity junkies with both a Super D and a Mountain Cross event.
The Super D blends aspects of both cross-country and downhill racing with an emphasis on the downhill part. Racers start in a Le Mans- style sprint to their bikes before hopping on and bombing down the mountain.
This year, Mountain Sports director Drew Cesati and assistant director Christian Robertson have a new course in mind for the Super D.
“We’re fired up about the course,” says Cesati. “In the past we used a mix of single track and road. This year it’s going to be wide track the whole way. Hopefully we’ll see some bar-to-bar racing action.”
The course will start at the top of the Red Lady Express Lift jumping onto Upper Meander. From there racers will turn onto the Luge, through the Keystone Flats and finish with the wide track course down Warming House Hill.
The Mountain Cross, or 4X, event is an entirely different beast with as many as four riders sent down a course rife with jumps, pump sections and high-walled berm turns.
The hole-shot is key to success in the 4X and contact is almost a certainty.
“Armor is encouraged,” says Cesati. “We’re hoping people will turn out for it.”
The Super D race starts at 6:30 p.m. and there will be no lift service available, so riders must get themselves to the start.
Seeding runs for the 4X will begin at 6:15 p.m. with the first race starting at 6:30 p.m.
“The Pinnacle has been well attended and we’re psyched to keep it going,” says Cesati.
Registration will be from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. on the 9380 deck the day of the races.