Weekend Racing

This weekend there was two UCI races. One in Gunnison on Western State Campus and one in Durango on Fort Lewis Campus. Conor, Brady, Danny and I were at both races. Conor and I raced in the Cat 3's. We were doing great the whole race on Saturday off the front with one other guy. Conor crashed with 2 laps to go, into a corner. It was just myself and another guy from Durango off the front. Then on the last lap about half way through the lap my chain broke. Conor came in second and I got a DNF with my mechanical. Then Brady and Danny raced shortly after. They both had a great race and both placed in the top ten with Danny finishing on the podium.
Then on Sunday the race was in Durango. Conor and I got there to warm up and get the course dialed in. But once we got there we noticed that we went off an hour and a half earlier then the day before. So we had no time to warm up or ride the course. We finished up 6th and 7th. Then again Brady and Danny rode a great race. Danny had a mechanical and worked his way back up. Both again placing in the top ten on a UCI race.

Zero Waste results from Boulder UCI races

Back to the race weekend that started it all in 2006 - the CLIF BAR Development Team started its Zero Waste events work at last year's US Gran Prix Series events in Longmont and Boulder.

Race promoters Rus Kappius and Chris Grealish were really keen on the idea of reducing the environmental impact of their events, and the team learned a lot working with Eco-Cycle on how to make sure as little trash as possible is generated at the races. For our first effort with the USGP races, we achieved a 74% diversion rate - so, only 26% of the total materials collected ended up going to the landfill.

Not bad, but we wanted to do better, and spread the idea of low-impact events as much as we could.

This year, we've partnered with the US Gran Prix of Cyclo-Cross Series and Crank Brothers to make the entire USGP Series Zero Waste, which is a huge task for races occurring in Louisville, KY, Trenton, NJ, and Portland, OR.

Locally, we're helping the BoulderRacing Cyclo-Cross Series go Zero Waste, and of course we were back out at Boulder's biggest weekend of racing, thanks to Chris Grealish's enthusiasm and support for Zero Waste events.

Over the Nov. 3-4 weekend, with the large UCI events (Redline Cup on Sat, Boulder Cup on Sun), the team worked hard to improve on our 2006 Zero Waste results.

The two races combined had a diversion rate of 80.3%. Resources saved: 2.8 trees, 819 kilowatt hours, 755 gallons of water and diverted 2320 pounds of compostable materials from the landfill.

Kappius and Summerhill in top 10 at Fort Lewis UCI race

Following up on their strong rides Saturday in Gunnison, CLIF BAR Development teammates Danny Summerhill and Brady Kappius both ended up in the top 10, scoring UCI points, on Sunday.

The race was held on the Fort Lewis College campus, and after a fast start both riders were in good position early in the race. A flat tire and a crash derailed Summerhill quite a bit, but he was able to scratch his way back up to 9th spot. Kappius rode smoothly all day and took home an excellent 6th place finish.

Some photos from the race can be found here.

Sunny California

Checking in from sunny California. A night of heavy rainfall created gorgeous cross conditions at the race. In today’s NorCal Cup #4, I raced the under 18 category and won my race and a large case of strawberries.

Bjorn

Summerhill on first UCI podium, Kappius gets first UCI points of season

Mountaineer Cross (UCI Cat. 2), Gunnison, CO - Saturday November 9

CLIF BAR Development 'Cross Team captains Brady Kappius and Danny Summerhill road tripped this weekend to a small pair of UCI-category 2 races in Western Colorado.

In Saturday's race on the Western State College campus, Summerhill used a great start to separate himself early with two of the strongest riders, Todd Wells and Joachim Parbo (Danish National Champ). While he couldn't match their pace, Summerhill rode a steady race to hold 3rd, the first time he's been on the podium at a UCI-ranked event.

Kappius also enjoyed a great start and rode to a strong 9th-place finish, gaining his first UCI points of the season.