Red Bull Hardline British Columbia 2026

Good day up on the hill. Asa laid down a heater in the middle section that couldn’t be matched. Big congrats to him. Clouds are starting to roll in so it was a good call moving it forward although the women got the short end of that. Wanted to see Lina and Tayte ride as well. Sucks that we haven’t seen a lot of rain the past few months but the worst days were for practice here and the World Cup. Wasn’t a fan of those uphill sections going into today and even less of a fan now. Lol. Slowed the riders down to much and reminded me that the builders have a background doing slopestyle courses with a speed check. Would much rather have had straighter sections that riders could have kept the speed up. It’s a downhill race at the end of the day.

Spectating was pretty brutal, makes you really appreciate the hiking trail on 1199. Awesome location just really hard to see anything, hopefully next time you can access a bit more of the track, or more than a few people at a time. 

Spectating was really frustrating. Spent about an hour walking up and down trying to find a spot with a view in the woods and ended up just going back down to the bottom with a view of the last jump and tv screen

Agree in the end on the uphill sections. While others have mentioned those sorts of uphills are core BC trail style, they just don't really work on a modern DH track IMHO. The little uphills on 1199 gave me the same feeling. I'm not particularly against them, but feel the tracks would all be better without them. But as expected the riders still put on an amazing show. Oli Clark's run was especially impressive, yet another 19 year old doing amazing things. 

Some armchair observations from racing that could be off the mark

Skinnies have no place in DH races

The bigger features looked so good on TV

Some of the camera angles were really good, others not so much

The broadcast/production was good, but had too much dead time/space between riders sometimes and prioritized some dull filler stuff. Hard to know how long each riders run is gonna be in advance though

Uphills caught two favorites out, both of those favorites were also caught out in Whistler on the 1199. As "locals" this is interesting.
Might be hard for any elite male over the age of 25 to win a World Cup in the coming seasons
Lachie is due a massive victory soon

The commentary was great, Eliot much more polished than Rob though

Jackson has had a lot of similar crashes this year, across practice and racing. Is it set-up related? Coincidence or....? 


 

🤷🏻‍♂️

It’s Hardline, not we-will-make-it-all-downhill-line. 

Some of the best gravity athletes on the planet admitted it was whipping their ass. Made them seem almost human🤣

Seemed to me that the track never let up and truly hung out the banner “Only the Strong Survive”

Best Hardline yet. 

Goober opinion from the midwest, but I think it was pretty good, awkward uphill and all. Jackson and Finn seem to be riding the same bad luck train, kinda crazy to have both whistler and this go bad for both riders. I think awkward uphill and slower tech still have a place in racing, maybe not every race, but it's certainly a skill. The in screen finish line camera has to go and the drones and rider cams need a lot of working out before I would include them in a professional broadcast.

The riders in between Asa and some of the other world cup contenders were still fun but it got me wondering if they should also make it a riders choice freeride jam? Obviously the racing stays the big show and everyone gets timed, but what if some of the freeride guys could do judged trick runs in addition to being timed. I'm not even really sure how feasible that is with these gnarly jumps and drops but if the riders were up for it and knew that was an option it could be cool. Save the scores till the end to keep the racing going and then maybe even have an award for fastest rider that also had a trick run? I'm probably getting way ahead of myself since so much of this track and other hardline tracks are already terrifying.

Hot, or maybe lukewarm take - of the commentary duo, Elliot is amazing but Rob is ok at best. I don't need to hear wowowowowow 15 times and the random yelling. Obviously he is still miles ahead of Ric....but that's a really low bar to clear. 

Bernard Kerr Hardline info:

This week's race was only the 2nd time in 13 Hardline races that Bernard finished lower than 5th. In those 13 races he has been on the 3-person podium 8 times, including 3 wins.

100% agree. Eliot was great. Even when being shouted over, although Rob always apologized to Eliot when doing so. Eliot and Ric would be an interesting combo tbh

Eliot is the best commentator in the biz. Full stop. 

I'll take the slow jank uphill bits over fast, straight motorway, which is boooriiing. Some riders made it look smooth and fast, others stalled out. It was hard, which is the point.

Hardline is way cooler than Rampage.

Just watched the replay and didn’t realize Tayte dropped in and then got her flat. Crushing.

Those aerial shots of the start hut are unrivalled. 

LOL Robot with the reefer madness take is perfect. 

princes of the sea 2 sky looking for core lord redemption both blowing it in the same spot is poetry. Like Whistler World Cup, it’s more interesting this way. 

Vermette is that one kid on the soccer team right now. Not only is he bigger, buts he’s stronger and more aggressive. More skilled and way more confident. It’s up to him how many he scores. 

Production notes: 

The live helmet cam was sickening, looked like it was from the 3.2MP Canon Elph we screwed on to that one skate helmet. Obviously a fine idea, surely it will be replaced in post (probably by now, cmon) with the full HD footage, but damn it was jarring to see! Stabilization is so good now!

Hat Guys (and Co) are still fine for this. It’s almost a full-on legit race now, could be quite soon, so maybe Red Bull could map their voices (and their hats, of course) onto those streamer skins so someone could come in and like have Rob Warner’s voice without all the holes in his brain. 

I am familiar with the dirt and rocks in that part of the world and the track looked absolutely insane to me. When that dark mud is spread over the rock, pedaling across side hill bullshit with roots of all shapes and sizes and visibility popping up…gnarly, the best part about mountain biking to me. A few of those sections seemed to go forever…

Definitely best Hardline yet, due solely to the rider list. Current World Champ, World Cup Champ, and the majority of the wins of the season? By far. Tippie shouldn’t be reading any scripts and don’t try to fake me out with pre-taped sideline reporterism, but shit was nice! Hat Guys are doomed though…what are you doing?

it must be wild to be a loc and to know that whole route in the winter too—knowledge of the terrain must have some standout sections. And good names. What’s the on/off zone called? 

you know, mayyyyybe the first Hardline is as good as this because it was the first .Whatever.

For no particular reason, here is today's forecast for North Vancouver as of 5:00 a.m. local time, from the Canadian government's meteorogy site ( https://weather.gc.ca/en/location/index.html?coords=49.314,-123.067) :

seems like it was the right call.

It rained here last night. The track would have been full wet again and sloppy. The worst section on the track faces North and isn't going to dry out again till next summer. Moving it to Friday was the right call. 

Great event I get the moaning about access but what they did in a few months track wise was impressive. I'm sure it'll be improved and refined for the next one. Great day out in the sun on the wobbly pops with the homies watching it. It was like been at a festival. 

Can't really compare it to 1199 that track and pedestrian facility has been in the making for over a decade with the might of Whistler Bike Park and Vail behind it. What an unreal month it's been for bike nerds in BC.  

I was thinking about that as I was watching yesterday. I think Rob does better when there is proper, high stakes racing and where position actually matters for points/overall. The Hardline races are my favourite of the year, but I don't think they don't carry the weight of a World Cup or World Champs race, so his excitement felt a little more manufactured. Obviously the track is more challenging, but the vibes are way more relaxed and there is way more camaraderie amongst all the riders (except when Bernerd gets all pissy about people not sharing lines). 

Also: 

• I get points are a thing in World Cup racing, but the world needs more tricks mid-run if you've crashed. Like, if you know you're not in contention, I wanna see sui's, t-bog's, one footers, flips and dirty whips. Thank you Hardline for providing some of that. 
• Also, what was with the 1st gen GoPro footage? There is no place for POV footage from an unstabilized potato in 2026. 
• Gutted for both Finn and Jackson. Nothing like kicking a guy when they're already down after Whistler. Disappointing end to both seasons. Hopefully both are back on form next year! 
• Really hope there are more women racing Hardline next year. Obviously just getting down is an accomplishment on its own, but those victories have got to feel a little hollow for Gracey when there is little to no competition. Maybe?

I’d imagine most the uphills were to allow for the track to connect the planned features and perhaps some speed management.  I tend to doubt the builders were like hey let’s have them pedal here as opposed to how we gonna get from here to here to here down this mountain.  

The part where Iles and Goldstone geeked it looks like so many trails in the region…like, so many. All the best ones have it lol

Logging road access and then “here it is” but you gotta crank up another 50 - 700ft 

makes it all the more notable that they blew it there 

also wild that it wasn’t until this Sleeper part that the classic Cypress shots came out. Did I just miss them? Rider silhouetted above a lip, cliff jump to nowhere? Always knew it was Cypress when I saw those in a snowboard thing… Red Bull got a few of the container ships in the background but they were always too high…

Those "classic Cypress shots" you recognize from snowboard video's are from Grouse snowboard video's not Cypress. If this had been on Grouse instead of Cypress there would have been a million of those shots.

No shit? 

That Billy Joel bit in the Sleeper edit slaps, who knew how good slow motion whips and Joel go together. 

So True! It also made me chuckle that they seem to be begging Jackson to slow down a touch by having him in slow-mo as the first rider for that song.

She's won 50k in prize money from the last few events so it probably feels less hollow than you think.

Hardline really shows the vast difference in the actual limits of men and women's downhill.

Imagine how good world cup tracks could be if elite men had their own course independent of women and Juniors 

I disagree hardline is great but it's basically the limit of what racers can race or possibly even ride, what makes world cup racing work is that the racers are comfortable enough to send it and that makes the racing tighter and better.

Okay but multiple racers have come out and said how unenjoyable it is to have everyone on the same line at having to race at full speed now in qualies as well just to qualify. Top guys could just coast down qualies in the red bull era.

I've loved every race of the last 3 seasons but only minor moments like that hop to the right off the main line in the lower section of lake placid stood out to me as truly creative bits of riding.

Listen to Sam Hill on neethlings podcast talk about how the secret lines he had wouldn't be possible in this era

Hopefully Maydena in February heralds the dawn of a new era in downhill

I don't disagree with more line choice at tracks at all, I'm not sure hardline is the best comparison if that's your argument though.

I'm a huge Billy Joel fan but I was not expecting THAT to pop up in a Sleeper edit.