 |
Snowbird Mountain Bout -- July
19, 2008 It was a beautiful day in the mountains as
the UMB team went into the 10th Intermountain Cup race of 2008.
Snowbird is generally agreed to be the toughest race of the season,
featuring technical singletrack, a brutal climb up the Dick Bass trail,
and a spooky loose tram-road descent. Our youngsters and beginning racers
were up to the challenge, and by the time the sport race started UMB
already had 79 team points. And after a successful race, a great picnic.
What a day! First place winners were
Joshua Peterson, Jared Muir, Darren Stirland, and Rachel
Hutchings, with 2nd place finishes by Dylan Tanner, Jay Griffin, Jolene
Nosack, Catherine Reay, and Shawn Nielsen.
Left: Kendra chases Jolene
along Snowbird's singletrack.
|
Joshua Peterson continues
domination
of the category with another 1st place.
|
Not too far behind is Shawn
Nielsen,
grabbing a close 2nd place finish. |
Mandy Clark tackles the
singletrack
and gets the 7th place spot. |
 |
Left: Brayden Nielsen heads
up the mountain
on the singletrack trail, taking the 4th place
position among the age 10-12 riders.
Right: Zachary Peterson motors across a
meadow
on the way to 5th place. The 10-12 category did
a lap on the same brutal trail that the older riders
tackled.
|
|
 |
Left: Rachel Hutchings navigates
through
the fir trees on the bird trail and gets the
the 1st place spot on the podium for her effort.Right: View
up the mountain as the tram heads
to the top of the hill. |
|
Beginner 13-15:
No UMB riders in BM 13-15
category at this race. |
 |
Left: Just 1/2 mile into the first lap,
Jared Muir
bumps the bike over a root in the deep woods.
Jared puts in a great race to nail the 1st place win. Right: Dylan Tanner cranks
uphill across a ski slope
as he heads toward 2nd place in the category. |
|
 |
Left: Darren Stirland fires
up the hill and
grabs 1st
place in the 19-29 group.Right: In
the BM 16-18 race, Jared and Dylan
dueled hard, changing leads as they sprinted
to the finish
line. In the end, Jared edged Dylan
by a bike-length. Jared was our fastest beginner-
class rider. |
|
 |
 |
|
Ryan Nielsen bursts
out of the woods
on his way to an impressive 1st place. |
Dale Hutchings hits a bit of
downhill
as he gets the 2nd place spot.
|
Karl
Parkinson rounds out UMB's
podium sweep with 3rd place. |
 |
Left: Jason Sparks powers
the bike uphill on
the singletrack with Jared closing in behind.
Jason again grabs a 3rd
place finish. Right: Brandon Balkman sums
up UMB's
fighting spirit as he races to 4th
place in
Beginner Men 40-plus. |
|
 |
Left: Justin Griffin heads
back toward the
finish line on the Bird Trail as he gets the
3rd place
finish.Right: UMB
HQ in the Snowbird parking lot. |
|
 |
Left: Danny Van Wagoner sprints
through
the woods. A flat tire on the 2nd lap puts
Danny on the trailside for a few minutes,
but he fights back to take 3rd place.Right: At
the UMB post-race picnic. Jason
made some great dutch-oven pork, and
other team members brought side dishes. |
|
 |
Left: Catherine Reay cranks
up the Dick
Bass Highway. Cat impresses the boys
with her 2nd
place finish in Sport Women.Right: Jay
Griffin and Mike MacDonald
enjoy the after-race picnic fare. |
|
 |
|
|
Eric Ellis cranks up the long
hill
and finishes in 4th place. |
Eric Taylor pops out of the
woods onto
a ski slope on the way to 7th place. |
Finishing in 9th place, Ben Hutchings
heads out for his last lap. |
 |
Left: Derek Ransom takes
the 4th place spot
in the SM 30-34 category. Flying through the
forest singletrack, Derek had the fastest time
of any UMB sport-class rider.
Right: Shane
Horton moves up to the sport category
with this race. Sadly, a mechanical disaster gives him
a DNF for his first sport-class outing. |
|
 |
Left: Bursting out of the woods into
the sunshine,
Darren Harris gets on the podium with a solid
3rd
place performance. Right: Greg Meyers heads
east up the canyon
on the Bird Trail as he gets the 4th
place finish. |
|
 |
|
|
With his race bike broken,
Jay Griffin
pilots an old steed to 2nd place. |
Jim Jackson gets a great ride
to the 3rd
place spot on the podium. |
Mike MacDonald cranks up the
brutal
hill to finish respectably in 5th place. |
 |
Left: Mike Engberson puts
in 4 painful laps
to finish at 5th
place as our only expert rider
in this race. Right: Back
from the mountain after shooting
racer photos, Jared enjoys a bit of the UMB picnic.
|
|
 |
|
|
Jolene Nosack and her 29er eat up
the
roots as she grabs 2nd place. |
Kendra Clark fights her way to the
4th place spot.
|
Sally Hutchings hits a dip in meadow
singletrack on the way to 5th place. |
 |
Left: John Van Wagoner powers
up the hill on his
way to
5th place in Men 50-plus.Right: Ryan
was again working his mechanical
magic for the team under the UMB canopy. |
|
 |
Left: Bruce Argyle spins up
the brutal Dick Bass highway on his final lap.
You have to feel good about riding while the guy behind you is walking.
Bruce gets 3rd place for this race.Snowbird
has a well-deserved reputation as a tough race. Some race categories saw smaller numbers of total
racers, so the depth of the UMB team allowed us to
score big. At 135 points, it's our highest team total ever. We increased
our season lead substantially -- the championship is looking very
possible, largely because of the UMB racers at Snowbird. Great job, team! More race photos are available at
http://picasaweb.google.com/utahmb/SnowbirdMountainBout |
[Team Index Page] [Team
Roster 08] [Team Member Profiles]
[Team
Signup] [UtahMountainBiking Home Page]
|
