MTB Team Kicks Off Its 2024 Race Season

Steve Smail & Amy Dortch, MTB Team Head Coaches
The USN Mountain Bike Team kicked off its 2024 season on August 25th at Chickasaw Trace Trails in Columbia TN, with its first of five races across TN. A familiar course to the team, now in its 12th year, nearly our entire roster of 32 High School and Middle School cyclists took on 1, 2 or 3 challenging 4.2 mile loops in typically hot, dry and dusty conditions for our first NICA/TICL League competition.
Led by senior captains Quinn Dehner, Leo Frein, Tate Green and Rohan Ramachandran, the HS squad finished 18th out of 30 teams. Race series HS team points were awarded to freshman girls Hannah Mackler (4th), Maggie Weiss (6th) and Adeline Miller (10th), and Frein (14th) for their front-of-the-pack performances. Fastest team laps came from Frein and Green, both at 21:22, with Avery Savona just 1 second behind the seniors, finishing 28th in the Sophomore category. Sophomores Charlie Blau and Caden Carrabba put in great  lap times in the intense heat of the day, and our large contingent of freshman riders (Basil Broemel, Seth Hauser, Aidan Harris, Emerson Unertl-Coffman and Suzie Zhao) kicked off their HS racing with clean laps, including a 22:01 lap from Harris. Mackler and Weiss’s early laps were in the impressive 23 minute range.
 
Our young but equally talented MS squad gained team points from performances by returning riders Elsa Absi (9th in 8th grade girls), Brianna Castro (13th in 8th), Mac Perry (14th in 7th) and new 6th grade teammate Brooks Lukach (27th), placing the MS squad 13th out of 25 teams for overall points. Brand new rider 8th grader Allen Chen put in amazingly consistent 25 and 26 minute laps, managing 32nd in a big and competitive field. Absi, Castro and Allen Chen were the MS riders able to complete 2 laps, while the remainder of the nearly all-new MS squad did one lap, including Clio Cherry-Pulay and Rosie Hauser for the girls categories, and Emmett Cheney, Caldwell Adams, Barry Chen, Townes and Vincent Van Zandt. Vincent suffered an early crash that resulted in an injured arm and unfortunately damaged half of his bike cockpit, and 8th grader Charlie McNulty started strong but also ran into double bike mechanical issues during his first lap.
 
In a growing league of more than 500 racers from across the state that includes many “composite” teams (rather than school-based teams), these results for both squads are just where we want them to be as we begin our lengthy season. Our 2nd race is on September 8th in Jackson, TN, where the team will take on the fast, sandy and flow-y trails in Pugh Bourne Park.

Full races results: https://my.raceresult.com/305025/results#0_1B6173

(Photos courtesy of Assistant Coach and USN parent Gregg Shepard)
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