ISOLATED UNITY
It’s not every day that you vie with teenagers for a podium spot in a dual slalom. In fact, the only other dual slalom I’ve entered was the last time I attended the Hornby Island Bike Fest—so long ago in fact that disc brakes had yet to fully make the crossover from motos to mountain bikes. Another lifetime, in mountain biking terms.
The grassy pastures of Strachan Valley shine like gold bullion in the morning sun, as a hundred-plus crowd of spectators begins to assemble alongside the banked corners and tabletops of Hornby’s legendary dual slalom course. It’s just one of the festival’s highlights (along with a trials competition, cross country, enduro and as much music, beer and homespun food as you can consume) that for a decade made it one of British Columbia’s most unusual celebrations of all things knobby. That is until more serious pursuits like having families and getting real jobs started distracting the organizers. But in 2018, when festival co-founder Tig Cross, on whose family farm the event took place, floated the idea of bringing it back after a decade-long hiatus—word spread faster than a wildfire in midsummer.
“I realized there were a lot of people who would be stoked to come back to Strachan Valley,” Cross tells me, alongside another Hornby Island festival pioneer, Sasha LeBaron.
Cross is short and stocky with a head of thick, wavy silver
