Ripping It Up With Toronto's Favorite Cross'r

An Interview with David Dermont

A fixture in Ontario's cyclo-cross scene, David Dermont has been racing cross for over a decade. Highlights include national titles in 98, 99 and 2001. This season has seen him win four races and is in a tight battle with Paul Greene for the series win, with the winner to be determined at the Provincials race at Centennial Park. Outside of cross, Dave is very strong on the mountain bike scene and often present at various cycling events around town.

He told me I should really start racing cross and that I'd probably be really good at it. I thought he was crazy, but decided to go out to one of these in Toronto, probably 12-13 years ago. We'd all get together and put $5 or 10 in the kitty. It was Jim Sciberas and his wife who were running it and they'd divvy the money between the top 3. There was hardly any tape or flags, it was very low key, but there were 25 people or so and everybody knew the course.

DD:Interprovincial even. Mountain biking is kind of interesting that way because you can really get inside the head of someone you have to race. You know how they deal with stuff emotionally and ways to attack. Tactically, you know what to do and you know how they're going to react when you do it. It makes it interesting when you know them that well. I've only developed that in the last couple of years. Usually I'd just go out and ride as hard as I possibly could and so it was all fitness driving it.

Now as you get older, you start pulling out little tricks so you don't have to be as fast - just slow down a bit. It's really cool when you meet someone for the first time and you're trying to figure them out, you have to do it right there on that race course. Its tough because they're hiding all their secrets close to their chests.

CXO: Do you find a lot of people come & go?

DD: It happens a lot and I'm really surprised. You forget, then people come back and I say "That's amazing you're a cross racer, I didn't know" and they say "yeah, but I was here 2 years ago".

I wish in the early season, everyone is talking, everyone buys a bike, everyone is talking cross. I'm really glad the website is here now, because I think it will drag some of these people out.

If everyone who said they were going to cross, crossed - we'd have 200 people at all of our races. You see everyone buying equipment, then for one reason or another - personal reasons, it rains, they don't show up. You wish you'd get 100% attendance.

don't talk about it, just do it, because it's not going to bite you...

Prisca and I have this running joke about this - "Just do it" - stop talking about it - "Just do it" - You're driving me crazy talking about it, just do it. I think that has to be a running motto for the website,don't talk about it, just do it, because it's not going to bite you... Everyone says "I don't feel that fast right now" or "I don't feel like getting dirty"... just do it.

But it's tough on equipment - I'm glad I didn't buy new wheels. Right now I'm running an old set of wheels. and I really need to replace them.

CXO: Tubulars or Clinchers?

DD: Clinchers - I ran tubulars the first year I rode cross - they were awesome, loved them a lot. They'd get wet and the cotton would peel off the rim and I'd roll a tire. So I thought I'd just simplify. But tubulars are awesome for avoiding pinch flats and they run so smooth.

CXO: Typically have any other problems with equipment?

DD: It seems to eat bottom brackets. It eats derailleurs.

CXO: What about bikes?

DD: I had that really short wheelbase bike which climbed like a goat. It was two sizes too small, then a custom bike made a lot of sense, so I bought a True North. It's been a really reliable steel bike.

CXO: You ride a True North on the road and off?

DD: Yeah, this year it was cool because I rode a 29'er - and I raced the year fully rigid - and everyone was freaking out at the OCup races. I took it up to Elliott Lake with heavy rocks and everyone couldn't believe it.

The nicest thing was that it was the same size as my cross wheels. So when I changed the bikes, there was no learning curve. Usually you get off the small tires (26") back on the 700's, there is a huge learning curve - the bike hits things differently, rolls over things differently, corners were all different timing. So it was kind of cool to get right into the aggressive riding in cross.

CXO: You've won at the Nationals before...

DD: I won a jersey once. I won Nationals 3 times and only one of them was a jersey because there weren't enough provinces representing. They wouldn't give out a jersey if there weren't enough provinces. The saddest part is seeing someone walk away from winning a national race without a jersey - you see their shoulders drop, but it was just a matter of attendance. It's brutal to have someone fly from Vancouver, then find out there isn't enough people representing.

CXO: In the elite categories people will fly, otherwise, people won't travel...

DD: Exactly... So that was really cool - I got a jersey and I wear it every Canada Day. That was in '99 as a Master A

CXO: You've won more than one though, right?

DD: Three of them - 98, 99 in 30+ and 2001 in 40+. It's been lot of racing... 12 or 13 years.

CXO: Raced in the States at all?

DD: No... I used to go to Quebec for mountain bike races. That was the only way to get really good at riding the rocks. I found alot of the Ontario riders were scared of Quebec because it was so rocky and the descents were totally different.

I've been talking about doing cross in the US for a long time. Need to get things together and go with a group. I'm really interested in doing the Verge races in Rhode Island (in December).

CXO: Interesting/Favorite/Difficult course feature? All the guys that have been Europe talk of beer tents...

DD: They had a beer tent at Ziggy's - really it was a mechanics tent they popped up, but there was only 2 people sitting in it.

CXO: And they weren't drinking beer....

DD: No, they were just trying to get out of the cold.

I'd say Ziggy's, dismounting on pavement and sliding for 3 or 4 feet and crashing into the boards. The top of the board was covered in blood from people scaring their shins on it. That was probably the worst. It was a total mountain bike race.

The first year I did it, they had a guy standing on the boards waiting, and every time he saw a mountain bike would go by he would pull the boards back. If you had drop bars, he'd push the bar back.

I'd come through and the guy in front of me was a cross racer with a mountain bike... He'd go ripping along, not telling him the truth and I'd get the barrier pushed in front of me.

I landed on this tree trunk and slid down it length wise.

There was a suicidal descent, before I had v-brakes, I had these really cheap caliper brakes. I couldn't stop worth a dime, it was terrible. I hit terminal velocity going down this hill and it had these rocks and I was going so fast I ended up jumping off the bike into the forest. I landed on this tree trunk and slid down it length wise. There were all of these broken branches sticking out.

I thought for sure I was dead. I pulled my jersey up and there was blood all over, but i didn't hurt myself, so I got back on the bike saying "I hate this course, I can't believe this"

He'd throw mountain bike courses at us. Your brakes had to be top notch. We were all buying V-Brakes and using brake boosters because we couldn't pull enough cable. Just trying to mate the wrong things. Just really impossible, insane.

We should have been just racing around on the grass with tape - you don't need brakes like that. So I ended up pulling the v-brakes off, but now they're building levers so they can pull enough cable for cantilevers.

CXO: What do you think of disk brakes for cross?

DD: I think its an awesome idea. I've seen a lot of people bend a wheel and finish a race. Tons of mud clearance, like you wouldn't believe. Anybody who wants to ride it, they're carrying around so much weight... The added weight, how could that be an advantage?

Also I think any race that is based around braking isn't a cross race. It's all about momentum, movement and how you transition over the barricades.

It's all about momentum, movement and how you transition over the barricades.

CXO: Success come pretty quick once you got into it?

DD: Cross was a different story, since we were all in one group, there was no age differentiation, it was the first three guys who crossed the line. There was a lot of pack riding, so I didn't know how I finished.

My first mountain bike race I won by quite a large margin and I was there with my mother. She was itching to go home, so we left. Later I called the store that sponsored the race to see how I did. The sales clerk just laughed at me and said "You won the race."

It was the sport race and the first hill climb everybody was walking their bike and of course I had this cross experience, so I just threw the bike over my head and ran past them. That is probably how I got so far in front. Once I was so far out I didn't know who was in my category.

The store clerk said "You had some prizes, but we decided to keep them." She pulled a mickey on me since she knew I hadn't been racing. I was about to hang up the phone when she said "No, I'm just joking"

Then I had a fierce season I was racing Curtis Gloade on mountain bikes... duking it out, battling it out.

With Cross I was always placed really well with the A's, where I started racing when the OCA divvied it up into age groups and I was kind of thankful for that.

It was hard. I can't believe I was racing that fast when I was a kid, well, not as a kid - in my 30's, because I was racing all of these amazing riders that I have a lot of respect for. So I am like wow, How'd I do that?

I used to think racing was about hurting myself, but now I think you have to look after yourself. I used to think you had to go out and bleed. I think that is where cross came from - Be really aggressive, no matter what.

I've kind of mellowed out and realized that you only have so much storage of energy, or abilities. You've got to take care of yourself, you can't just go out and waste yourself. There are a lot more races after that one. That was the bigger lesson, probably from the longer mountain bike races.