Singletrack 6 2024 - Stage 5: New Denver (Rosebery) Recap

Stage 5: New Denver (Rosebery Trail Network)

There are some tough-ass people here at Singletrack 6.

Allow us to present Mimmo Futia, the fittest looking 60-year-old you’re likely to see. And the muscle isn’t just for show: Mimmo, a long time Kent Washington resident who immigrated from Italy in 1987 as a Fiat mechanic, stayed with the top 10 to 15 riders for the majority of today’s unrelenting, 1,400-meter machine-built climbing trail. In fact, he offered sage words of wisdom and encouragement as he passed some of us while grinding uphill.

“Don’t worry—the legs will come back around. Just give them a few minutes.”

Thanks to a similarly impressive performance on the descent, Mimmo would go on to finish 14th overall today. Now, consider for a second that the top eight to 10 riders are elite/pro or former pros. Consider too that we’re on day five of six with 10ish hours of racing on our legs. Thanks, Mimmo, for giving us something to aspire to. Your strength, drive and good nature are an inspiration.

As for today’s stage, we climbed for a long while then we descended for not that long. Then finished! To the water! After five days of racing, riders are getting tired and the difficulties presented out on the track are beginning to crack many.

While cooling in Slocan Lake, staring at the surrounding mountains and contemplating Mimmo’s performance and the nature of effort, we met Morgan Molnar, 31, of Toronto, and the race’s only singlespeeder.

Morgan is riding a Specialized hardtail with a 30-21 gear ratio. He says he showed up with a 32-tooth chainring, pre-rode before day 1 and quickly realized he was way over geared. He hustled to the local bike shop and was able to find and install a 30-tooth prior to stage one. Morgan says he’s done his fair share of pushing his bike this week but has largely enjoyed the challenging terrain, made considerably more so by his weapon of choice. When pressed, Morgan said that he probably wouldn’t bring the hardtail one-speeder again. But his wry smile makes us think that he probably would. And we like that.

Morgan finished 42nd today, but it’s worth noting we left town with 7km of fast road riding and today’s uphill bits got fairly steep near the top—neither of which are great places to be stuck in a middling gear. Nice work, Morgan. Way to show us all how it’s done.

-JW & CD