more good news from the cycling club and a wrap-up on their season..its
long but it'll keep ya amused!! have a great day!! =) sydney
CANADA: A Short Cut to the Midwest
What happens when you combine 6 Vermont students, 1 mini-van, 6 Mountain
bikes, 16 wheels, 2400 miles of driving and 4 separate national
championship races. Well, you get the National Collegiate Mountain Biking
Finals and UVM's participation in them. This year UVM's revitalized
Cycling Team dominated Mountain biking in the East by fielding a solid
team of mens and womens riders in all categories. These riders were
successful in maintaining a lead in the overall standings throughout the
season, from the opening race at Syracuse through our own event at
Catamount to the end of the regular season at UMass. This combination of
strength and numbers helped place UVM in the top three at every regular
season race they competed in. The only stumble came at the Regional
Championships at UNH where Vermont was relegated to 4th Place by very
strong squads from Penn State, UNH and UMass. This aberration from the
rest of the season did not dampen the spirit of our riders and when the
team for the nationals left from the circle in front of Patrick Gym
Thursday afternoon they had nothing but high spirits for the upcoming
races. The 6 men who competed were Jason Baer, John Berlinger, Shawn
Durkin, Bill Lockwood, Larry Perarra and Issa Sawabini, of these men none
had been to finals before and all expected to have as much fun off of the
bike as on. From the beautiful and sunny (compared to Wisconsin) Vermont
the riders headed west, way west, all the way to the land of Cheese curds,
Great Lakes and cows, but before they got to race they had to travel
through 6 states , one foreign nation and numerous "rest stops". The
drive out was a long one with the 6 riders alternating in pairs between
trying to sleep and driving, luckily the guys never fell asleep when they
had to stay awake and were able to sleep when they shouldn't be staying
awake. Some of the best parts of the trip were experienced on the
Intestates and in the van. Its amazing how well you can fold 6 guys up
and all there cloths and blankets and music and fast food trash and still
have room for warm soda, day old bagels and too many boxes of TIMBITS.
For those of you who have no idea what a TIMBIT is imagine yourself in
Canada, any where in Canada, and you want Dunkin' Doughnuts, well you
don't go to Dunkin' Doughnuts because it isn't there so you go to Tim
Horton's and buy stuff that looks, acts and generally tastes likes Dunkin'
Doughnuts except "Fred" never thinks its time to make the doughnuts and
they call munckins, TIMBITS. Maybe because of the rude Border guard on
the way into Canada or maybe because it was between 3 am and 6 am when we
drove past the flat, boring, nearly treeless expanse or maybe because gas
is about 65 cents a liter and nearly 2 dollars a gallon (if you can figure
out how to convert liters to gallons and then multiply by the price and
finally factor in the exchange rate) and how you still get your change in
Canadian money, even if you gave them a brand spankin' new 20 dollar bill,
or maybe it was because the only vehicles on the road were Big Rigs with
11 axles and tons of cargo that always seemed to drift into your lane on
that narrow bridge that the title for this story was though of, but it
happened none the less, for us Canada was, "A Short Cut to the Midwest."
But what a short cut it was because we were able to arrive at "Devils Head
Resort and Convention Center" with plenty of time to check in, scoff at
the sign that stated "No Bikes in Rooms", adopt the lone rider form Notra
Dame, pre ride the Cross Country Race Course, go to Ponderosa for a big
"all you can eat" meal and then head north to HO-CHUNKS Casino and win
some money in the quarter slots. For any one who has never been to a
Casino, it's a blast, but only if you have the brains and will power to
leave the ATM card in the van and only allow 5 or 10 bucks to surface from
you pocket.
With this night on the town over the next order of business was to
sleep, and sleep is what happened, for the next day would begin the racing
with the Duel Slalom National Championships starting at 9 am sharp. To
begin the morning the "B" riders, men and women, were briefed on the rules
for the Duel Slalom competition and then were sent up the hill to start
the racing. For most of the Vermont team and especially its B-Team of
Issa Sawabini, John Berlinger and Larry Perrara this race would be the
first real Duel Slalom event. Earlier in the season at UMass there was a
Duel Slalom race, but the course was short, tight and boring here was a
course worthy of a National Championship and the team attacked it with a
variety of techniques. One was to almost crash at every turn and end up
finishing 28th (out of about 100), the other was to race against a team
mate, do fairly well and finish in the top 15 and the other was to
decimate the entire field of riders and win by over 2 seconds and become
the Men's B National Duel Slalom Champion for 1997. The first rider was
John Berlinger, the second was Issa Sawabini and the final rider was Larry
Perarra, for his accomplishment he received a gold medal and the
satisfaction of knowing that his times would have placed him third in the
Men's A field, which had its fair share of guaranteed Pro racers. In the
"A" race of 204 racers, Vermont kept up its dominating way and fielded
three more riders, Bill Lockwood, Shawn Durkin and Jason Baer. Bill
ended his day of Duel Slalom racing with the biggest rooster tails of
dirt, mud and grass seen all day, Jason was smooth and fast, but for
Vermont it was Shawn Durkin who surprised everyone, and him self, by
qualifying for the Finals. His time placed him into the last round of
head to head competition, because of the inverted order of running he
raced against the fastest rider of the day and was beaten, but only but
1.5 seconds. For his strong ride and smooth times early in the day he is
now one of the top ranked College Duel slalom racers in the country ending
up where he started the final round, 32nd in the nation. With the duel
slalom race over and the awards presented it was time to prepare for
Sundays Cross Country race. Since the fields would range from 100 to 180
riders it was key for the course designers to shatter the pack into
smaller groups before they would enter the tricky single track sections of
the race, to do this they used the geography and placed the start at the
bottom of the biggest , steepest, longest hill at the resort and
instructed us to go up. This climb is what made legs buckle, breath
disappear and riders stumble. This climb was a focus of much discussion
and strategy, but essentially when the watch ticked down and the starters
voice went up thinking went out the window and the mad scramble for the
top began, it was this start that set the stage for the rest of the race.
Again the day was divided between the A and B races with the Men's B
starting at 9 am. The starting positions were selected randomly by school
with Vermont being drawn 57th out of 62 schools, pretty poor luck but it
matter naught once the race began. The B's all finished in the top third
of the field surprising themselves a little bit and ending up 32, 26 and
Larry Perarra again showed the nations riders what it takes to be a
mountain biker and he was able to finish the race in 6th place. His
strength on the climbs, speed in the descents and skill in the technical
parts helped him to ride over, around and through all the hills, holes,
mud and muck. He represented the school and its team better than any one
had expected or hoped and since he won on Saturday and finished so well on
Sunday he became the Men's B Over-All Champion and won for his hard work
and fast times a brand new top of the line GT frame.
The Men's A race began at 2 pm and Vermont's riders were up
against some very stiff competition, included in the field were riders who
race professionally as well as on the collegiate circuit. This fact put
into perspective how tough the field of 180 riders would be. From the
start it was an all up hill struggle for Vermont. Half way through his
second lap Jason Baer began having mechanical troubles, his front shock
(which had misbehaved in the Duel Slalom race the day before) up and died
on him leaving Jason with out a functioning fork and in for a rough ride,
but while this was not a terminal problem his chain self destructing was.
In the most technical section of the course the chain snapped and left
Jason with no alternative but to end the day standing on the side line and
cheering on his teammates. Bill Lockwood and Shawn Durkin were left to
represent the school and this they did, though both had troubles. Bill
ended up stopping once to have his cycling tights cut off of his body
because they had become so torn that they got caught on his seat, which he
later shattered in a crash that left him with a broken seat and no water
bottle cage. These difficulties definitely slowed Bill, but didn't stop
him and he rode strong all the way to the end of the race. Shawn Durkin
was not having as strong a day as he had with the Duel Slalom, but he rode
through serious troubles to finish the race well and salvage some more
points for the squad. Incidentally both Bill and Shawn had raced earlier
this semester in Costa Rica in a 300 mile stage race. They competed for
three days and rode against some extremely talented international teams,
they did this under the UVM banner and gave our team some international
exposure.
With the final race of the weekend over, all that was left was to
clean up, eat up, party and drive. One interesting event at the banquet
that saw the Cross Country Champions crowned and the over all winners
presented with there medals and frames was the streaking of the whole
party by six members of the Fort Lewis College team from Durango,
Colorado. Three guys and three girls bared all but their faces to bolt
before the yelling cheering mass of riders, officials, mechanics, coaches,
parents and friends. This final act topped off a great weekend and led
nicely into the drive that was ahead. About 9:30 Sunday night the team
was at the van saying final good bye's, checking the wheels and frames on
the roof one final time, and loading up to head all the way back here to
Vermont. With everything tight it was off on another 1200 miles and
incidentally Canada is not only a great short cut to the Midwest its also
a great short cut back to Vermont.
Gordon "Humble Servent of the People" Daniell
"Get a bicycle. You will not regret it if you live." -- Mark Twain,
"Taming the Bicycle"
