Rating 2010 CTS

Three stars is good...

Course *
Course Marking **** A few distance left signs would be nice
Meals ***** Qty and quality both good
Awards Ceremony ***
Volunteers/Staff *****
Feed stations ****
Post ride food ***** Chocolate milk and subs were excellent
LODGING AND FACILITIES
Day 1 **
Day 2 *****

NOTABLY GOOD:
- A good group of racers in the event. Had a great time joking with cabin mates.
- Great shower and bathroom facilities on Day 2.
- Fun trails at Sir Sams (well designed)
- Ride to start was actually nice to spin out the legs
- Beautiful scenery at Day 1 camp.
- Washing stations were well set-up and managed
- Again, great staff and volunteers!
- Swag bag was good
- A chance to chat with Shamus and other pros
- Adam - stayed happy, worked hard

AREAS FOR IMPROVEMENT:
- Day 1 - many riders were wandering about after an exhausting day of riding trying to find their cabins. This included lugging their duffle bags full of gear. Either provide more direction, have the ATV/Trailer help out, or even deliver the bags to the cabins. Day 2 was very good.
- Mother Nature can't be controlled and can raise havoc with trails that are poorly designed or routed - both of which could have been controlled.
- There was little to no sign of effort being put into trail improvements. (It may have been done but was certainly not apparent). Lots of unnecessary spray painting on roots on the last day but most bridges were in very bad shape and could easily have been fixed. I would suspect that a donation of material would be welcomed by ATV clubs for trail maintenance days. Could ATV club members not be recruited to assist in hauling dirt/cedar/stone to problem areas - benefiting their own network? Reroutes were ridiculous. New trails were cut in areas where it seemed very obvious that would easily turn to mud, particularly on Day 1.
- Either put hand sanitizer at the beginning of buffet lines or have kitchen staff serve the food. Sickness spreads quickly through stage events, particularly the week-long events.

GENERAL:
Chico runs first class events and I have participated in many of them for over a decade. Furthermore, I have encouraged very many others to also enter, and will continue to do so. CTS was also a tightly run and well organized event with one glaring exception - THE TRAIL CONDITIONS ABSOLUTELY SUCKED. They deteriorated quickly throughout the field, hence the top riders would ride significantly different conditions than those further back. (It turned to a several km hike-a-bike after feed station 2 on Day 3.) Given finite time and $ for mtb events, I hold little sympathy for a trail designer who doesn't learn a lesson after the first year. 2/3 of the CTS's were a mud slog - it just happened to be the 2 events that I entered.

Was the event fun? Yes - everything except the riding
Are you just a complainer? If so, so are just about everyone else who rode around us for 3 days. (Unless you were at the front or like continually getting on and off your bike in the mud for 3 days, or perhaps aren't aware of what good trails are...)
Was it good value for the $? Yes - everything except the riding
Would you consider attending future CTS's? I will try other Chico events but will not be re-entering any 3 day CTS in the foreseeable future.