You couldn’t ask for a more perfect day for the NICA NY Finale at Windham Mountain. Clear skies and sunshine greeted us as we pulled into the windham mountain resort. After a quick meeting we set off to pre-ride the course.
The course for all races was 2 miles that traversed up the mountain and then back down. Right off het start line the course starts its ascent up the mountain. The gravel start filtered down into some grassy sections and woodsy single track. There were some steep, rocky rooty uphill sections and some long sunny grindy climbs. About halfway through the course stopped climbing and the descent back down began. The downhill has some tricky rocky turns, rock drops, bridges, technical single track and flowy berms to finish up the lap. All in all it was a course that will test fitness and skills we have been practicing all year.
Coming into the championship race of the season, R-Cubed Composite was in the top spot for overall teams. Senior Varsity Teammate Connor was unable to attend the finale race, so we knew we had to race our hearts out if we were going to hold that spot to be the NICA NY State Champions.
Since the course was so short, there were 3 waves of races for the day. Wave 1 for middle school, wave 2 for Freshman and Sophomores and wave 3 for JV and Varsity.
Eleven Middle school students took off at 9am in the first wave of the day. Eighth grade boys were the first race off.
Joe bolted up the hill off the start line giving him a good placement through the first section of single tracking. Loving the downhill sections he raced his way to his first top 10 finish of the season, finishing in 9th place! He was the 4 th highest scorer in team points for R-Cubed Composite.
After getting a caught in a pile up crash right at the start line, Reese struggled to pull his bike seat out of another competitor’s wheel as the rest of the field disappeared up the hill. Once out, he hopped on his bike charged up the hill to catch up to the rest of the racers. He made up a ton of time and race his way to a 15th place finish.
Clayton Managed to avoid the race start pile up and rode confident throughout the race. He finished his season with a 16th place finish.
Charlie was having bike issues before the start of the race and were not solved before the race start. Since he missed the race start the league allowed him to start his race with the freshman boys in the next wave. Racing up with the high schools didn’t scare him and he fit right in. Not letting let the challenges he face before the race defeat him, he rode confident, finished all 4 laps and was awarded points for the 8th grade race.
Trinity was our only middle school girl racing at windham. All smiles, she raced her way to finish in third place, and second place in points for the middle school crew.
The hills were no match for John, who crushed the course to finish in 4th place for 7th grade boys. He had the fastest finish on R-Cubed Composite Middle school crew.
With a lot of experience in downhilling, Owen was super excited for the second half of the race course. He bombed his way down the hill to a 16th place finish.
Ryan finished the race in good spirits despite not getting his bottle hand off in the feed zone during the race. As the day went on it was getting pretty hot out there and hydration was very important. He finished out the day in 25th place.
Jasper used his fitness to work the hills in the course to race to a second place finish, his highest finish of the season and the highest finish in the R-Cubed composite middle school group.
Ethan had a breakout race at Windham. He rode smooth and confident right off the start line and cruised his way to his best finish of the year, in 11th place! That made him the 5th highest point scorer for
the R-Cubed Composite middle school team!
Logan made the course look easy on his sweet Klein bike finishing in 15th place at windham.
Sam stepped it up this race knowing the team needed all the points it can get to retain the top stop in the league. He finished in the top 10 for the sophomore boys finished in an impressive 8 th place, his best of the season! This gave him enough points to be R-Cubed Composites 4th scorer for team points!
After a late start to the season and attending 1 practice the week prior, Nick was jumping at the chance to race! He signed up for the league and the race right before the morning pre-ride and jumped right in! He finished an impressive 8 th place in the Freshman Boys race for his first race ever!
Colby started the race strong but decided to stop racing when he felt ill. The heat and sun can be challenging to all racers, but its best to know when to stop racing before injury happens.
Collin started the race strong, but the heat took a toll. Determined to finish he kept riding. He finished 22nd for freshman boys despite the setback.
By the 3rd wave of the day I was getting pretty hot out and the sun was still beating down. The JV and Varsity races too off at noon.
Owen shot off the start line and never looked back. He raced his heart out and killed the course, finishing 7th place in the JV race…..just 3 seconds off the podium! His impressive finish helped the team
earn valuable points for the team competition.
Dylan looked strong out on the course, finishing in 29th in the JV boys race.
Captain and senior Simon killed the downhills during the race and finished out his NICA career with a 30th place finish in the JV Boys race. He will be missed next year!
Maxim had a strong start in the JV boys race but got an unfortunate flat on the second lap of the race. He quickly repaired it and continued racing in good spirits, finishing in 32nd place despite the setback.
Rory left it all out on the course for her last NICA race of her career. The senior and captain kept pushing the entire race knowing that every place counted for team points and finished in 4th place in Varsity Girls. We will miss her leadership, enthusiasm, passion, encouragement and spirit next year as she continues her cycling career at the University of Denver.
Erin strategically battled back and forth with for the lead throughout the race, and was able to create a good gap right before the finish. She finished 1st for Varsity girls to close out the season.
After tallying all the points for all the teams the league R-Cubed composite Won the NICA New York State Championships by 120 points!
The team really came together in the end, cheering each other on and working together to achieve their goals. It was so fantastic to see everyone cheering their teammates on and helping them throughout the season. They are all are amazing!
The NICA New York league recognizes the top 5 athletes in each of their classes who earn the most overall points across all the races in the season. R-Cubed Composite had 8 athletes who placed in the top 5 of their classes:
Jasper 4th Place overall 6 th Grade Boys
Emma 4th place overall 7 th Grade Girls
John 3rd place overall 7 th Grade Boys
Trinity 3rd place overall 8 th Grade Girls
Fiona 5th place overall Sophomore Girls
Connor 4th place overall Varsity Boys
Erin 2nd place overall Varsity Girls
Rory 5th Place overall Varsity Girls