Party time!

Hey gang!

Thank you all so much for making this summer a huge success! It was of course our first year at Valmont, and it sounds like everyone loved the new venue. We've got some plans to make it even better next year, too.

The money raised this summer goes directly to the CU Cycling Team, supporting us throughout the long collegiate racing seasons (mountain, track, cyvlocross, road and BMX). So we're thrilled with this summer's success. It couldn't have gone so well without the help of so many dedicated volunteers, and of course all of you coming back to race every week. As a way to say thanks, we are throwing a party tonight at Rocky Mounts: 2055 26th Street in Boulder at 6pm. We'll have food from Half Fast and drinks from Oskar Blues. So come out one last Wednesday to celebrate with us!

A huge thanks to our generous race sponsors:
-Josh Whitney for hooking us up with EVOL, Goodbelly and PharmacaLife prizes,
-Full Cycle for wrenching and grilling hot dogs every week,
-Julie Hudetz with a bunch of Nite Ize schwag,
-JellyBelly and Gatorade for a ton of goodies throughout the Summer.

See you at Rocky Mounts tonight!

Last race of the series!

It will be the last adaptive race of the summer too! So remember the augmented schedule:
4:30 p.m. - Registration begins
5:00 p.m. - Kid's Race ages 9 and under (10 minutes)
5:15 p.m. - Women's B and Juniors age 10-14 (15 min)
5:35 p.m. - Men's C's (20 min)
6:00 p.m. - Men's B (25 min)
6:30 p.m. - Adaptive Bikes (20 min)
6:55 p.m. - Women's A and Single Speed (25 min)
7:25 p.m. - Men's A (30 min)

And bring your costumes! Points and prizes (at least jelly beans) for everyone in costume, and special prizes for the best in each category! I think we'll do a vote by crowd after each race, so stick around.

We also have some hefty prizes for the series winners, but you have to be here to claim them! Also be on the lookout for a potential short track celebration party next week. Details on that, and tomorrow's course, forthcoming.

See you tomorrow!

One race left!

It's official - in the realm of race hand-ups, jelly beans are easier to grab than cash. Maybe with all that climbing this week, everyone was more eager for the magical beans. One of the expert cash graps was Margell Abel, who held on tight to a 5-dollar bill - a nice accessory to go with her Women's A win. Bjorn Riley has locked up his lead in the overall with another win this week. Luke Kriedl extended his lead over Henry Rapinz in the kids race as they finished 1-2 in a sprint, but Henry can still take the overall with a good performance next week.

Check out some of Dejan's photos in the Corkscrew, and take a look at the results from the past two weeks: July 31, Aug 7, and the Overall Standings

We still have a bunch of tight competition in the standings for the last week. The top 3 in the Men's C's are within 35 points, though Scott Gurst has been on a role lately and will certainly do what he can to hold on to his lead. In the single speed category, Tom Hopper and Brad Berger are tied for the lead, and Justin Sheldon is close behind. Lydia Tanner and Ksenia Lepikhina are within 3 points of each other in the Women's A's battle for 2nd, and Karen Hogan is nipping at them too...

To make things more interesting in these tight races, we're awarding 5 points (and jelly beans) to everyone who shows up in costume next week, and 40 points to the best costume in each category. The question is - how should we vote on best costume? Pre-race voting by audience cheers? Maybe post-race to not cut into your warmup?

Design those costumes, and get pumped to celebrate another great short track season!

Course Change for 8/7

James Moro brought up a good point about sand mixing with suspension, so we're scrapping the sand pit. Instead we're running a hilly course tonight -- supposing the weather holds. Check here and Facebook for updates based on weather.

Also, last week's results should be coming shortly.

Already August!

Only two weeks left in the Short Track Series this summer. Our last race was another success, with more than 120 racers. A big thanks to Margell for helping score, allowing me to jump on my bike for a race.

I'm through part one of my travel, just unpacked. And now repacking for trip #2, catching a flight early tomorrow morning. I'll hopefully get back early enough Tuesday night to have results up before Wednesday's race. Thanks for your patience with that.

Since we didn't run this course on the 24th, we're thinking this week will be up the corkscrew and through the sand pit.


 See you Wednesday!

July 24 Cancelled!

Well, it was bound to happen some time. We had lucked out with weather so far, but tonight is looking grim. We've got some rain and lightning at the bike park now, and radar is showing more to come. So no racing tonight. The sand pit will have to wait for another week.

If you already pre-registered for tonight's race, we'll carry that over to next week for you.

Also note that next week has an augmented schedule. We'll be putting on another adaptive bike race, so the schedule will be adjusted like last time:
4:30 p.m. - Registration begins
5:00 p.m. - Kid's Race ages 9 and under (10 minutes)
5:15 p.m. - Women's B and Juniors age 10-14 (15 min)
5:35 p.m. - Men's C's (20 min)
6:00 p.m. - Men's B (25 min)
6:30 p.m. - Adaptive Bikes (20 min)
6:55 p.m. - Women's A and Single Speed (25 min)
7:25 p.m. - Men's A (30 min)

See you on the 31st!

Clunk, Clunk, Clunk, Clunk....

That was the sound that accompanied chain-slap as you all sped down the Belgian Steps last night. I must say, it was fun and impressive to watch. I think there was only one casualty from the steps, though at least one rider slid out on the surprise mud at the bottom. Yann Ropers has some pictures from last night.

Of course John Mansell was there -- as always with his cyclocross bike. He dismounted and sprinted down the stairs, and showed us all how to remount and speed off again. He'll be ready for the fall/winter cross season for sure.

Josh Whitney provided some entertainment throughout the evening - he brought a bunch of prizes for the night - t-shirts and burrito coupons from EVOL, delicious chocolate from Pharmaca Life, and drinks from Good Belly. The entertainment came in the hand-ups of chocolate bars and burrito coupons. They both proved very challenging to hang on to. The entire crowd cheered loudly when finally one racer successfully pocketed a burrito coupon.

The results are posted, and with some tight moves for the overall in a few categories - the top 3 in the Men's C's are all within 30 points of each other. The standings will be interesting in these last few weeks. Remember that we're dropping the 4 lowest scores for the entire 13-race series, so with 9 races down, the rest will go to improving older scores.

We apologize for the terrible delay at the start of the evening. But it was awesome that so many racers were patient and even happy to help us with the final course adjustments. Thanks a ton to all of you who helped out so much there. We'll do everything we can to make sure the shortage of course setup staff and park construction don't occur together again.

Don't forget about Valmont Trail Work, tonight (Thursday) at 5:30, and we'll see you next Wednesday.

Valmont trail work on Thursday

Hi everyone!
Up this week, we have a super technical course, with rock-drops and stairs, and a fair amount of climbing. The course looks something like this:

We'll also have prizes from EVOL, PharmacaLife and GoodBelly Drinks, so bring your A-game, even if you're racing C's!

The other big announcement is that Boulder Mountain Bike Alliance is doing a trail work day at Valmont, Thursday evening. The short track series has seen unprecedented race numbers, which has been awesome! We love that so many people show up to race and enjoy the park. Of course, having so many racers does put the trails under some extra stress. 

So please come out Thursday to help out for a bit. Tools will be provided, so just bring some work gloves. Sign up to volunteer here.

Thanks, and see you Wednesday and Thursday!

Technical course next week!

It was a hot one last night, and attendance was a little low for it. However, we had a few highlights on last night's smooth and flowy course:

• Kevin Bracy-Knight out racing on a Fat-Bike
• Single Speeder Mark Baudry finished with his signature wheelie
• Scott Gurst (a long time veteran of the series) got his first short track win!
• 5-year-old Joshua Lucas did his first mountain bike race ever, a single day after taking off his training wheels!
• Two legendary A riders almost went into trackstand mode in an awesome duel near the finish of the Men's A's -- Brady Kappius and John Mansell duking it out in a manner of sorts.

We also had a few changes in the overall standings! Results are in the usual places - check 'em out. Also check out Dejan's pics from July 3rd's race (among others).

A few things to note - with how smooth this week's course was, we're making next week's course very interesting. We'll have forced rock drops (no go-around options) and a descent down the Belgian Steps. This will be a course for the full-suspensioners. (We'll of course have some options for the kids race.)

We're also working out specifics with EVOL for some prizes, as well as a series-end party.

Themed races: We might add a bmx/dirt-jumper race for August 7 - it'll be one heck of a race. We're also inviting costumes for August 14th, as usual. Prizes for the best costume.

We've been taking note from Barry's Thursday-night crit series in Longmont with the fruit spread. We've been happy to supply the watermelon for racers every week. However, would you prefer some other fruit too? Perhaps oranges?

See you on next week's technical course!

Happy Independence Day!

Thanks to everyone who was still around for the holiday who came out to our 7th race at Valmont. The watermelon, courtesy of Charlie Liu, was very refreshing throughout the hot evening. It was also fun having some sweet gear from Nite Ize to give away as prizes for the races. We'll have some more for next week too.

There were a couple missed attempts at the cash handups that we had, but a couple riders grabbed and pocketed like seasoned pros. The bunny hops and wheelies made scoring the finish entertaining for me too.

The results are posted in the usual spots. There are a couple of big shifts in the standings since a few key riders were missing this week. Brady Kappius, Bryan Alders and Allen Krughoff in the Men's A's were all missing, though Sam Morrison was turning some really fast lasps and may have gotten the birthday win anyway. However, the worst 4 races get dropped, so we'll have to see if their absence remains to be a factor.

Enjoy the holiday and long weekend! We'll see you at Valmont next week!

Hand-Cycle Speed at Valmont

We were thrilled to be able to host a race for adaptive cyclists last night! Hopefully we can spread the word about how much fun it was so we can get more of the hand-cycle community out for the next one on July 31.

Last night, a friend even had his quad-rotor camera flying around to capture some footage. I should be getting a link to the video soon, and he may come out a few more times to record the other races too. Aerial footage of CU Short Track at Valmont can only look incredible!

The course last night had a little of everything, with a long section through the glades, a little climb, and the fast sweeping descent down the corkscrew. At 1.1 miles long, lap times ran anywhere from 4 minutes to 5 and a half. It seemed like a lot of people had fun with the course, especially coming through the finish area towards the parking lot. Brady Kappius took the hole shot at the start of the men's A's and had a LOOOONG drift through the first turn, spraying dirt and dust at the crowd. Mark Beaudry finished the single speed race with another insane wheelie.

Full Cycle was out there again with their awesome grill-bike. On Bike-to-Work day, they rode that and towed their tent all the way to Valmont. Seeing everyone's enthusiasm out there, showing huge 2-wheeled spirit, makes me happy to be able to put events like these on.

Results for "A bit of Everything" are up here, with updated overall standings here. Oliver Hart is closing the gap on Juniors leader Bjorn Riley, while Thatcher Wine overtook Tony Prete in the Men's C's. Erin Huck took the Women's A's win and overall lead in Ksenia Lepikhina's absence. In the Men's A's, Brady Kappius took the win, extending his overall lead from 1 point over Sam Morrison to 11.

Next week's schedule is back to normal. Being the evening before Independence Day, lets break out the red-white-and-blue kits! See you on July 3!

New Schedule Next Week

Wow, a lot of Boulder must really like hills! More than 160 racers came out Wednesday night for a lot of climbing - and naturally a lot of descending too. There were a bunch of first-time racers at this week's short track too. It's great to see everyone's enthusiasm out there. I saw some great wheelies out there too coming across the finish line. Maybe later in the summer we'll add a separate wheelie competition.

Next week, the 26th, we're adding a racing category - adaptive bikes for riders with disabilities. We're squeezing the schedule a bit to fit it in, but we're excited to provide a great racing venue for some extra-dedicated mountain bikers. The course for next week will have a bit of everything, some glades, some climbing, and of course, the corkscrew.

4:30 p.m. - Registration begins
5:00 p.m. - Kid's Race ages 9 and under (10 minutes)
5:15 p.m. - Women's B and Juniors age 10-14 (15 min)
5:35 p.m. - Men's C's (20 min)
6:00 p.m. - Men's B (25 min)
6:30 p.m. - Adaptive Bikes (20 min)
6:55 p.m. - Women's A and Single Speed (25 min)
7:25 p.m. - Men's A (30 min)

With the sun setting so late, I hope you A racers don't mind staying out a bit later. See you all next week!

The Tour De Glades

"If I could only do one race for the rest of my life, I'd be perfectly happy w/local midweek stxc, especially the CU Cycling Team series."
    - Spencer Powlison

Thanks for the very kind words, Spencer! We are glad to be able to put on a fun mid-week race series for the community, and knowing how much you all enjoy it makes us even happier.

We maintained the same numbers tonight as the record-setting turnout from last week. Maybe it was the draw of a flat course, but the course was still plenty long. Lap times were coming in around 5 minutes, with the Men's A's topping out around 4 and a half minutes. There was plenty of excitement in every race - partially motivated by avoiding mosquitoes - I got eaten alive during tear-down tonight.

Sorry to keep this recap short - I need to pack and sleep before traveling tomorrow through Tuesday. (That's right, I plan my travel around being at Short Track). But thanks again for the huge turnout, and thanks to everyone who suffered through the mosquitoes with us to make cleanup quick and easy. Tonight's results are posted in the usual spots. I may have made an error or two in my haste. Let me know, and I'll fix any issues when I'm back in town.

3 more things:
1: Nothing's official yet....But EVOL...It's in the works.
2: Hills are on the schedule for next week - after two whole weeks with no corkscrew we figure it's time to play around up there again.
3. Hog Roast at Rocky Mounts tomorrow evening, supporting Community Cycles

See you next week!

Schedule Change for Tomorrow

Tomorrow's going to be another hot one. Hopefully not quite as hot as today was. To keep you from overheating, tomorrow's race will be the Tour de Glades, a 1.3 mile course that avoids climbs while hitting plenty of berms, jumps, and drops.

As for the schedule, we're moving the single speed race to 6:40, with the Women's A's starting just after that. This should make scoring much easier, and we'll have cleaner, faster results for the Men's B's this way (hopefully). This will be the schedule for pretty much the rest of the season.

We'll have some more modifications with details we're still working out. We've been planning with the EXCITE program to host an adaptive mountain bike race category. The first one will be June 26th. We're still tinkering with how to fit the schedule in. So stay tuned for that.

One last note - Rocky Mounts is hosting a hog roast on Thursday, with Oskar Blues on tap. It doubles as a benefit for Community Cycles. Check out the details here, and we'll see you at Valmont tomorrow and at Rocky Mounts Thursday.

Race number 3!

What a night! It seemed like every racer was having fun, getting big air off the rock drops and pulling wheelies across the finish line. We had a whopping 143 racers during the evening - 21 more than last week! I guess word is spreading about all the fun at Valmont. I'll have to check our racing records from past years to see if it's an all time best. It's gotta be close.

We had Full Cycle grilling hot dogs all night, which were very tasty and very much appreciated by hungry volunteers such as myself. A huge thanks to all of you who raced - we're really glad that so many people are enjoying the races we're putting on. And thank you to all the volunteers who came out to help - course setup, registration, marshaling, grilling, doctor-ing, and cleaning up the course afterwards. We really appreciate the help.

A few notes:

There were a couple of people who did not check in - I recorded some racers whose names and numbers were not on the start sheets. Be sure to check in with registration at every race, even if you're pre-registered and have a number.

We actually have a new waiver that everyone needs to fill out - it includes both the University and the City of Boulder releases on it. You only need to fill it out once this summer, but it is different from the waiver we had the first week. So please check in. Also, take a look at the results to make sure I got you placed correctly.

How the night went down:

Carden King has some new competition in the Kids race, he took 3rd to Luke Kreidl and Dale Boyer. An incredible 21 other kids enjoyed the course too! In the Juniors race, Bjorn Riley stayed with Nolan Stevenson until just before the last lap and managed to get a nice gap for a solid win. Not morally defeated, Nolan slowed down to pop a wheelie for a 2nd-place finishing photo-op.

After a strong win last week, Marina Lepikhina took 2nd to newcomer Brittany Jones, who started out a little slow in 4th, but got her groove and passed a rider in each of the last 3 laps to take the win.

This was the first short track of the year for 8 of our 12 Men's C's. Christian Long and Brendan Lee finished 1-2 with a 15 second gap over 3rd place Michael Bachman. Bachman has won the C's competition in past summers. Are these guys on form to upgrade and fight with the massive B field? The B's had 40 racers, which included a few riders who upgraded from the C's. None of them could keep up with newcomer Maxx Chance. Maxx says he's still looking for his form, but he might think about A's for the next short track. Racing against faster bikers gets you faster too, after all.

Brad Berger, a former CU Cycling National Team mountain biker, was flying through the back end of the B field, doing sub-3:30 minute laps. He couldn't shake Tom Hopper, but did manage to hold on to the win. Tom's 2nd place increased his overall lead over Mark Beaudry, who ended 5th on the night.

Our Women's A field is getting some good attendance now. Nicole Duke and Erin Huck have fought hard in past short track series for the over-all. Nicole was absent yesterday though, so the rivalry will have to wait. Diedre York started out fast, with lap times around 3:40 on the 1 mile course. She slowly let herself drift back towards the end, making sure she's well-rested for upcoming Worlds. Erin Huck capitalized on that and took the win (now tied with Nicole for the overall).

The 29 Men's A's riders were flying through this course, taking risks through slippery turns, and attempting a few passes with alternate lines through the obstacles. Their lap times were around 3:15 for most of the race, led by a group of 5 that included Brady Kappius, Sam Morrison and Bryan Alders. Bryan and Sam were able to drop the other 3 in the final 3 laps. Bryan, who is fresh off of a long rest due to injury, and with a lot of pent up riding energy, sped around Sam on the last lap to take the win by 5 seconds. Sam's 2nd place pulls him within 14 points in the overall of leader Brady, who finished 5th on the night. About 3 minutes after Bryan's win, Kurtis Barth held a very impressive wheelie over the line for 20th place.

We didn't keep count, but we think John Mansell did upwards of 50 laps on the night, who started his warmup during the C's race. We're going to have to keep track next week.



Thanks again for coming out, and we'll see you next week!

Racing this afternoon

The light drizzle this morning is just enough to keep the dust down for later. The trails are looking great, so we'll see you all later! The course this week hits the glades, some optional rock drops, a bit of gravel, plenty of passing opportunity, and though you get a break from the corkscrew this week, you'll have a nice table-top jump on one short descent.

As for the schedule, we'll keep the single speeders racing after the B's today. We're still hoping to get some more feedback from riders today before making any changes. It looks like some options would be Single Speeders going before the Women's A's at 6:40, or Women's A's going after Single Speeders at 6:10, and Men's B's going at 6:40. Be sure to let us know your opinion on the matter at the race tonight!

Rider Poll: Single Speed and Women's A's

Since the Men's B field is always the largest, we were thinking that having the men's Single Speed field go a minute after them is annoying - both for single speeders to need to navigate the B field that they catch, and for us to score and keep straight.

So we've been thinking about having the Single speeders start at 6:40, with the Women's A's starting a minute after them. Thoughts?

Let us know in the comments.

Week 2 in the books

The morning rain dried up in time, and 122 eager racers got to enjoy a long course at Valmont. We're still playing around with the course start - that hole shot was very important this week, with only about 50 yards to the single track. I think I only saw one crash as a result of the hard braking and crowding there though.

8-year-old Carden King started things off, showing what Boulder racing is all about. He improved over his 3rd place last week to win the kids race this week, and then jumped in the Juniors race. 11-year-old Torin Bickmore also moved up from 3rd to 1st in the Juniors race. Both of these young riders have the overall lead in their respective categories, though Bjorn Riley is just 1 point down on Torin.

After the Kids race, Sam and Beckett Cassan found where the mud was still nice and wet. Sarah from the Daily Camera included them in her article, which you can read here.

Ksenia Lepikhina has been tearing up dirt at short track for years, and now she's gotten her mother, Marina, into it. Marina took the win in the Women's B's too! Not bad for her first CU Short Track race. CU racer Garrett Brown is in good form after the collegiate road season; he won the Men's C race by a good 10 seconds over Tony Prete. The Men's B's had an intense chase for the top 5 spots. Junior racer Wyatt Svarczkopf had a slow start, but managed to move from about 6th to 2nd before the end of the race. He may have been only 1 lap away from catching Stephen Shepherd, who never let off the gas at all to earn that victory. The single speeds had a lot of shuffling around throughout the race, but Tom Hopper came out on top for the 2nd week in a row. Mark Beaudry held a really long wheelie across the entire finishing straight, rolling in for 5th.

In the Women's A's Ksenia was on Deidre York's wheel until 4 laps to go. Deidre, who's gearing up for worlds, gave us a preview of her form as she then took off, winning by a 20 second gap over Ksenia, who was another 20 seconds ahead of Tammy Sadle. In the Men's A's, Brady Kappius got another win. But he didn't get to relax on his birthday. Sam Morrison was within 5-10 seconds of Brady the entire race. Zane Godby kept things interesting holding out single dollar bills for riders to grab coming through. (John Mansell was hoping for an ice cream prime - maybe next time). Will Nabours jumped up to the A's after winning the B's last week. He managed a very solid 8th, and one of those dollars from Zane.
Dejan Smaic was out there taking photos again, and hopefully we'll have a link to those soon. In the mean time, check out the results and photos from last week.

May 29 - Racing is ON!

Thank you sun gods! The course is drying nicely and we'll have everything set up and ready to go. See you all in a few hours.

Why does rain like Wednesdays?

Rain, rain, go away,
we want to race short track today!

Hopefully the sun will come out and dry the park, and the afternoon showers will stay away. If things are looking good, we'll race. If not, we'll let you know by 2:30pm. If that's the case, we'll move your pre-registrations to next week's race.

Stay tuned to the latest at twitter. We'll go dance for the sun gods.

And the series is under way!

Thank you to the 109 racers who came out with enthusiasm! We had some great racing on a somewhat short course. Dawson Bauer came through flying in the Kids race to start things off. He had a large gap over 2nd place. Nolan Stephenson did the same in the juniors 10-14 race, with lap times around 3:20. He's come in 2nd in the overall in the past, and looks as though he's been training to win it this year. We had a couple of juniors 15-18 racing, but they opted to race Men's C's (and absolutely crush the rest of the field, Eric Brunner) as well as the other elite categories.

Will Nabours dominated a few early season cat 4 races to get his Cat 3 upgrade, where he consistently places in the top 10. He had a rough start in the Men's B's, but he showed how his road power converts to mountain biking. It took most of the race, but he managed to catch and pass Tim Godby, winning by a few seconds.

Diana Tanner is a newcomer to the Women's B's at Short Track, and she might be an A soon. She had a nice gap to her win over Marian Mead (2nd overall last year) and Brittany Engleking (last year's winner). The Women's A's had the smallest field on the day. Nicole Duke started things off with a blazing 2:56 lap, and then settled in at just over 3 minute laps after that. Michele Norosad had some series chain-suck at the start, requiring Kaj from Full Cycle to work his magic. Jumping in on the 2nd lap, she couldn't keep up with Nicole, but kept her within a 20 second gap the entire race. Claire Bensard and Michelle Bliss rubbed elbows fighting hard for position, with Claire beating Michele out by a few seconds at the end.

The Men's A's took no mercy on the first lap - with last year's winner Brady Kappius coming through after an INSANE 2:15 first lap. Once everyone found their positions, the pace eventually settled to 2:40 lap times.   A group of 4 riders stayed with Brady until 2 to go when he once again put the hammer down. John Mansell attempted the course on his cross bike, which slowed him down on that corkscrew descent and some very loose dirt sections, but he made up time on that long uphill. He finished proudly after a tough race, that followed about an hour or so of pre-riding. A few other riders had a lot of fun with the race, one making a different animal noise every time he came through the finish (clucking, barking, howling, I think I heard a horse neighing as well in there...), and one of our single speed riders held a very impressive wheely through the finish.

Check out the full results here, and let me know if I misspelled your name (I think I got most of them right). Donny was out taking some Photos, as was Dejan, so stay tuned for some links to their galleries.

Some notes about the race: we're sorry the generator died so early. We'll be sure to have music for all the categories next time. As for the course, it seemed everyone felt like they were almost always climbing, but then enjoyed the corkscrew descent. We're limited in how much of Valmont we can take up, but we'll try to make the course a bit longer for next time. We'll also put the finish in a wider section so that those close sprints at the end won't force one of you into the grass.

Please let us know what your opening impressions are of Short Track at Valmont. How does it compare to the Research Park? There are fewer parking spaces there, but was the parking situation still adequate? Be sure to thank the Valmont and other City employees for their efforts to getting our series put on there. Finally, we're still looking for a few more volunteers. So if you can offer a hand and would like a free race entry, email us.

See you next week!

Racing tonight!

The series begins tonight! Are you pumped? Racing at Valmont! Woo!

Check out all the details here, and read through some of the policies that we're requesting of you before tonight. Mainly, be nice, don't litter, stick to the trails, and stay off the sensitive grass. Now share the flyer with everyone you know and we'll see you in a few hours!

Series Scoring Questions

Our summer series is mostly for fun. It's a great Wednesday evening, enjoying the outdoors after work. And we're really excited to make use of Valmont Bike Park. Of course, it works well as tune-ups for major races, and counts for a good workout. Some racers of course take our series very seriously. (There are some prizes in the works for series winners...maybe that has something to do with it.) That being said, we've been debating on how to score the series.

In years past, we've had a couple different methods for scoring, with mixed reviews. This year, we'd love your input first. Here are some of the options we've had and are considering:

1. Totaling every single race. It comes down in part to pure attendance. We of course like attendance; it means more money raised for the CU Cycling Team. People get sick though, or go on vacations, and may miss a race anyway. Should missing a day be reason to loose the overall?
2. Dropping the worst 3 races. This way, you can go on that vacation without feeling too nervous about your positioning in the standings. 13 races is a long series, so maybe drop the worst 5. But then our attendance may drop.
3. Score 50 places deep, so that everyone has points on the line, and you still get fun and aggressive racing for 20th place.
4. Score just 15 deep, and everyone else gets a few points purely for attendance. That way, there is still an incentive to attend, but a top-5 racer who flats and rolls in slowly for last doesn't loose as much to the overall leader as if we were to score 50 deep.

Or some combination of the above? Or other options? As it stands now, we are thinking of dropping 4 races, scoring 15 deep, and giving points for attendance. See the last sheet on last year's results as an example. What do you think? Let us know in the comments.

Moving to Valmont Bike Park

We've been working closely with the City of Boulder Parks and Recreation and will officially be moving our Summer Series to Valmont Bike Park! We're really excited about it and hope you all are too. Over on Valmont and Airport Road, you'll get a bunch of new courses with more variety, still with the same fun atmosphere we've always had. Great mid-week family activities - mom and dad can shred some single track, and the little juniors can develop their fat-tire skills (free for them as always). We'll also be working with EXPAND to get some of those modified super-aero mountain bikes racing a few times this summer too.

Only 2 downsides to VBP:

1. The facility fee requires us to bump up prices for registration; and

2. It's a little further out than the ol' Research Park, but you should bike there anyways. Just think of it like a longer warm-up.

Check out Kris's article about it over at 303 Cycling. We should have pre-registration up at PreRace later today or tomorrow. We'll see you next week! (at VALMONT).

Spring in Colorado...

It's May 1st. That means short track is right around the corner. What's with the foot of fresh snow? I guess head up to A-Basin and enjoy it. But I have faith it will be gone by the time our Wednesday night series kicks off...just 3 weeks away.

We're still waiting on a few last minute details to get finalized, and we're still looking for a couple more volunteers and prize sponsors. Once we have everything lined up, we'll get a flyer out, and you'll be the first to get it.

In the mean time, sit tight, tune up your suspensions, and cheer on our road team at Nationals this weekend in Utah! Woo! They're going to crush it!

We'll see you on May 22nd!