SECCC Conference Championship

Clemson University in northwestern South Carolina hosted the 2008 SECCC Mountain Bike Conference Championship. Hannah and I both raced every event which included short track, downhill, and dual slalom on Saturday and cross country on Sunday. It was an action packed weekend full of nonstop racing.

The team trailer fully loaded with racing machines.

Several teams were in our hotel, and things got pretty crazy the night before the race.

Short Track was first. Here is the men’s A field about to start.

Lees-McRae men took first and second. Several other Lees-McRae riders also finished in the top spots.

The first half of the course was a gradual double track climb.

After the climb there was a hair pin turn that went into some fast but relatively technical single track for a short track race. The single track was all downhill or flat with some roots, a short rock garden and some berms hugging fast turns. My friend Peter was ripping it down the hill and was on his way to a great finish until he flatted.

I raced B in short track. I had a hard fought battle but was still only good enough to get third behind my teammate Sandre and a rider from Cumberland University.

Sandre started out hard, immediately shredded the field, and lead the race from start to finish. I was fourth into the single track and moved into third on the double track on the second lap.

This Clemson rider stayed on my wheel for the first several laps. He tried to pass me early on only to get pissed off that I didn’t move out of his way on the double track. I told him that it was a wide trail and that if he wanted to pass he had better go around me. A lap or two later he did, and my legs had no answer to his attack. Before long he had caught second place and I had moved back to fourth.

This guy started out faster than me and stayed just head of me for most of the race. Both of us were pretty close to Sandre for about half the race but neither of us had enough power to close the gap and before long Sandre was gone out of sight.

I fought hard and finally caught him with three laps and tried to make a pass. Once he realized what was happening he put in such a hard attack that I couldn’t get around him and he actually opened a small gap on me. The next time around I tried again and this time he had nothing left for a counter attack. I moved back into third and maintained my position to the finish.

The rest of the team cheered us on.

The women were up next.

Me and Hannah discussing race strategy. I had a serious case of helmet hair.

This girl destroyed the field and won with a comfortable gap. Hannah survived over half the race before getting lapped and pulled out.

Lees-McRae women placed second and third.

Downhill was next on the agenda. I don’t have a downhill bike or any gear so I raced my Trimble fully clad in spandex. This made for a pretty wild ride though it was a fairly tame DH course and I skipped all the big  jumps. My gravity skills need some work as I placed second to last in my class in downhill and failed to even qualify in dual slalom. Hannah is back in action and completed her first downhill race since her injury. Despite a fairly conservative run, she still placed in the top half of the women.

Slalom was right after downhill. The course was very fast with a lot of jumps which made for some spectacular crashes.

Hannah raced well in slalom, placing third.

Hannah bravely decided to race cross country despite coming off of two months of not being able to train and still beat some of her competitors.

Carla got revenge for the short track by destroying the pack in cross country

Aaron’s race face

Head coach Brian Sheedy

I got upgraded to the A race for cross country. It was a lot longer and tougher but more fun, and I was happy to move up in my level of competition. The start of the race was chaos as there was a large field with a short jeep road into a very narrow hole shot. I got stuck in some serious traffic early on and spent the whole first lap of the race trying to pass people.

The trails were super fast and fun with some very fast flowing downhills. There were a few rough spots that were hit at full speed after the downhills. It made for exhilarating racing.

After about the first lap, the field became very strung out and I rode most of the rest of the race alone. I caught a few riders towards the end and finished 14th out of 29 racers.

Brad after his victory. He beat me by 18 minutes!

Sandre smoked me once again finishing 9th.

Here I am hammering it up the final climb after over two hours of racing.

Every part of my body was sore after the race. Me and Hannah were both totally walled out after 4 races in two days, but we both had a lot of fun and went home maxed out and satisfied.