Pool C
Ryan and Lentz flourish, last quarterfinals slot determined by hot saw
LEHI, Utah — Pool C of the springboard chop at the STIHL TIMBERSPORTS Quarterfinals featured two lumberjacks from down under competing for the best time and eight points toward a trip to the Semi-finals in Columbus, Ga.
Mel Lentz got out to a fast start in the second heat, overcoming the soft wood near the bottom of the poles that many competitors have taken issue with. Lentz's only hiccup came as he finished, when his axe hung in a fifteen-pound half of the top block and dragged him off his springboard to the ground.
Lentz posted a time of 50.31 and looked particularly comfortable using his off hand to take out the strap wood on the back side of the block, which he attributed to "about 30 years of chopping." However, Dale Ryan bested Lentz's time by about seven seconds, posting a 43.16-second run.
"It was the first event; I was a little nervous," Ryan said. "It's one of me best events, and you anticipate that you'll do well in it, and that."
Ryan disputed the complaint of soft wood, saying his time was slower than it could have been and that good equipment makes all the difference.
"It should have been cut in 36 (seconds), I reckon," he said. "It's good wood.
"It's all about your angles, and you've got to have good clips — some of them are weak and not forged up enough."
Both Ryan and Lentz like their chances going through the rest of the competition and Ryan even offered up a prize if he can make the Semi-finals before the final, hot saw competition.
"If my job's done before that fiasco, I'll give [the hot saw] away," Ryan said.
Stock Saw
In a round riddled with near-disqualifications, all eight competitors in Pool C of the stock saw competition eventually managed to post official times.
Winner Jeff Skirvin almost saw his pool-best time of 12.88 seconds rendered invalid as judges reviewed tape for an infraction concerning Skirvin's hand position at the start. According to Skirvin, the stock saw competition is one of the most difficult because of the speed and delicacy of the cuts that must be made.
"It works your fine motor skills, in that your nerves can get to you," Skirvin said. "It's such a close race that one bauble, and you're done."
Skirvin, in what is admittedly one of his stronger events, outpaced Dale Ryan and Mel Lentz in his stock saw win.
Lentz, who was closely behind Dale Ryan in both of the first two events, said that doing well early was everything.
"You've got to position yourself really well," Lentz said, "second, third, or fourth in the early events."
Unlike many competitors, Skirvin enjoys the rough-and-ready vibe of the hot saw event and says he's looking forward to the final event of the competition.
"I grew up running chainsaws — my dad ran hot saws," he said. "I raced my first one when I was 10. It was a go-cart motor.
"I say, 'No motor, no fun.'"
The final heat of the standing block chop pitted two heavyweights of chopping and leaders of Pool C, Dale Ryan and Mel Lentz, in head-to-head competition in the STIHL TIMBERSPORTS Quarterfinals.
With three heats of times above 20 seconds, Ryan and Lentz had plenty of room to maneuver themselves to the top of the heap in the event, but Ryan, again, took fullest advantage.
Though the two went chop for chop for much of the heat, Lentz got his axe hung up near the end of his run and took two extra chops and nearly four more seconds than Ryan's 16.995-second official time.
"I should have cut it in about 15 seconds," said Ryan, who was shaking his head and visibly limping following his run.
"I've been on some pain killers," he said. "I've had a crook hip since February."
Dealing with the hip pain was made particularly difficult in the standing chop, in which competitors draw all of their power from crouching and driving the swing from their lower body.
"When your hips are bad," Ryan said, "you can't get up underneath the cut — use your legs."
Ryan won the heat, but Lentz's extra swings gave second place to American, Mike Forrester by three-tenths of a second.
Single Buck
After several minutes of judges reviewing tape during which time Forrester admitted that, from the replay, it appeared he'd lost, the official word proved him right.
"That little skip cost me right there," said Forrester watching his replay on the jumbotron screen, "It jagged right there in the center."
Edging Forrester 12.87 seconds to 12.98 seconds, Bosworth wasn't surprised that Forrester had given him such a close run in what is Bosworth's best event.
"I've competed against Mike for a lot of years, and he's a good sawyer," Bosworth said. "And he's right there in the points, so I knew he'd go hard."
Overall, the pool was close, with the top four times spanning less than one second. Pool leaders Mel Lentz and Dale Ryan dropped out of the top three in the event, making Forrester and Bosworth's good finish even more important.
"I needed the points," Bosworth said. "I've had an average day and threw away some points in earlier events."
Underhand Chop
In 19.75 seconds, Ryan left his competition in his wake, but, he said, he was going easy.
"It means a bit," Ryan said of the draw for different Pools in the Quarterfinals, "because if you draw the right bracket, you won't have to work as hard.
"I'm not going 100%," he said.
Branden Sirguy and Nathan Waterfield brought in second and third in the event, respectively. They were matched up in the same heat, and, in the closest set of times of the day, only one-hundredth of a second separated the two.
Lentz edged Waterford for second place in the chopping championship and Lentz trails Ryan by only five points in the overall Pool C standings.
Still feeling the twinge of a hip injury, Ryan said he would use the next two weeks to tune-up before the Semi-finals in Columbus, Ga.
"You won't see a 10-blow cut on the front (of the underhand chop block)," said Ryan of the finals. "I'm going to have to train, chop a few blocks and get things sorted a bit."
Hot Saw
A trip to Columbus, Ga., and the STIHL TIMBERSPORTS Quarterfinals came down to the hot saw competition for one competitor.
Skirvin adopted a wait-and see strategy for his run.
"I'll make my cuts and let everybody else mess up,'" he said, after posting a time of 8.127 seconds.
With the two disqualifications, all Forrester had to do was make three cuts within the three-minute allotted timeframe in order to edge Skirvin by two points.
"Heck, it's nice going last in the hot saw," Forrester said, "to see what you have to do. I got a little nervous up there but [my assistant] was saying, 'you've got time, you've got time,' and I did."
Forrester posted a time of 16.417 seconds, placing sixth, and earning 25 total points to Skirvin's 23. Joining Forrester in Columbus will be Dale Ryan, Mel Lentz, winner of the Stihl Sawing Championship, and Carson Bosworth.
"I had to keep my head about me," Forrester said. "I started off terrible, had a couple bad chopping events, had the saw vibrate underneath me in the stock saw."
This is the second time that Forrester has scraped his way into the quarterfinal.
"It was the same deal last year," he said, "couple guys messed up in the hot saw and I just had to make my three cuts."
Skirvin, a young competitor just working his way up in the ranks of the STIHL TIMBERSPORTS series said that getting so close to the quarterfinals would make him train even harder during the off-season.
"It'll make me more determined," he said. "It's kind of like dangling a steak in front of me."
