World Championships of Dual Slalom at Strait Acres

Among wildfires and diseases, the 2020 World Championships of Dual Slalom at Strait Acres went off without aplomb outside of San Diego. Legendary cliff-hucker, bike-bender and meat-eater, Kyle Strait, invited the slipperiest, steeziest velocipede pilots to his dream property for a drag racing extravaganza of knob folding. Throw in a taco party, some adult beverages and a scrub competition on the FMB and it's no wonder we're all faint with FOMO right now. Gorge yourself on the gratuitous gated grappling. Photos by Jame Stokoe

Kyle Strait on hosting the event

Practice

The most serious World Champs ever.

Big Teddy

Kialani Hines

R-Dog

Scrub-tastic.

This is so much more fun than Rampage.

Scrub Comp

Strait's slalom track has the dopest FMB. No, not Freestyle Mountain Bike tour, but (expletive) Me Bump. It's giant wall of dirt in the middle of the track, destroying all speed unless a rider wants to be sent into orbit. It's the perfect obstacle to showcase bike bending talent. The best bike benders on the track gave it their all in the Scrub Comp.

David Lieb with the dual-apendage dab down.

Voreis is allowed to do anything he wants in any contest.

Kirt Voreis on giving Kyle candy when he was 9

Braydon Buzzhurst

Mitch, doing it wrong.

Mitch doing it a little more righter. The second-best part of this is seeing Matt Collins filming!

Race Day

When the scrub comps and shenanigans were in the recycle bin, it was time to race and crown a real, actual Dual Slalom World Champion of Strait Acres. The track was mint, and the game was on. In the end, the women couldn't get close to Kialani Hines as she won convincingly. $2,000 for Kialani, 15 hundo for Alaina Henderson and a cool G for Dixie Owens in 3rd. That should cover SoCal gas prices to-and-from the venue.

Kyle Strait and Mitch Ropelato ended up in the finals, which was also, coincidentally, a secondary battle for the King of SRAM-RockShox-Super-Stylish-Do-Your-Own-Thing rider award. When the day was done, Mitch took the win over the multi-tasking race promoter. It's reported here will be litigation over the pink slip to the Strait Acres property as a result of Strait's loss. Mitch earned the rainbow stripes (but the rainbow colors are in a different order than the UCI rainbow for legal and trademark reasons). Well done, Mitch. Strait may have squatter's rights, so be prepared.

Women's Race

Alaina Henderson and Kialani Hines.