Collegiate Race Season!

Collegiate race season has begun!  We have the cargo trailer set up to take bikes to and from races safely!  Thanks to those who put it together!  You did a great job!

Our first race was this weekend hosted by UO/OSU in Eugene and Corvallis, OR.  It was a wet weekend.  Everyone did a great job! Kaila did great in her first races ever!!!  Brian Hannibal did a great job representing the Mens C field all by himself!  All 4 of our Mens B team (Josh, Matt, Alex, Brian M) placed in the 10 ten in the Crit with Matt getting second!!!  Josh placed forth in a break away in the Mens B field!  The mens B team did a great job working together.  Katrina also was the lone women’s A rider!  Everyone did great!  For more results, they are posted here: http://users.moscow.com/wykoff/index2.htm.  Click on results on the left!

To watch a helmet cam from the men’s B race visit: http://vimeo.com/3844490.  You can see the Vandals in yellow dispersed throughout the video!

The Men’s B team are also currently ranked #1 in the NWCCC!  Great work!

Vandals will be racing this weekend at WWU/UW (Bellingham and Seattle, WA). For more details on upcoming races check out: http://users.moscow.com/wykoff/index2.htm

Wells Fargo Twilight Criterium and Idaho State Crit Champs

This last weekend was the Wells Fargo Twilight Criterium and the Idaho State Criterium Championships in Boise, ID.  This weekend was a lot of fun!  At the Twilight Crit we had 3 racers in the Mens Cat 4/5 category.  Josh Egan, Zach Hannibal, and Keith Bickford all represented the University of Idaho well!  This was Keith’s first road race ever, let alone crit!  He did a great job and is now excited about racing!  The field was full with 75 racers.  The field ended up being seperated into 2 and the second field ended up being pulled since they were close to being lapped.  Zach ended up leading the second pack and won the sprint and ended up in 26th place!  Josh was in the main field and stayed in the entire time!  He ended up getting 25th place!

The only field for women was Women’s Pro.  So, Katrina Finley got her upgrade to Cat 3 this week for this race.  Well, Kristin Armstrong also did the race!  If you don’t know, she is representing the USA in road cycling going to the Beijing Olympics in 14 days!  She lapped the field.  Needless to say, Katrina was not expecting the race to be that fast.  Anyway, she had fun, but was pulled pretty early on with thousands of people watching.

Sunday was the Idaho State Criterium Championships.  Zach, Katrina, and Brian Hannibal all raced representing the University of Idaho.  Katrina raced in the Women 3/4 field.  The awards from the Idaho State Road Race Championships were given out before the race (which she got a silver medal in). During the race she stay in the entire time!  She got 6th which was ok.

Zach and Brian raced in the Men Cat 4/5 race.  They both did great.  Zach got 13th and Brian got 14th overall (separated by a lap or two)!  For Brian’s first race he did great, as he was lapped by the field he caught back onto the pack and managed to hang on for another 8 laps!  Overall the Vandals had a fun weekend and had a good showing with some new riders!

Check out some of the pictures…

Zach and Josh after their race…Josh wore his kit all day long!

Josh finishing the Twilight Crit. on his new Planet X rims!

Brian after his first crit!

Zach during Idaho State Championships

Brian during his first crit!

Brian, Katrina, and Zach after the state champs!

Cutest brothers on the team…Brian and Zach…Brian has a bloody nose.

Keith during his first crit!

Idaho State Road Race Championships

Last Sunday, June 15, 2008 two Vandals went down to the Boise area and competed in the Idaho State Road Race Championships!  The race was held outside of Melba, ID.  It was a fairly flat course with a few very small hills.  Wind was the only real challenge on the course.  It was a sunny and fairly warm day.  Jerry Long, Vandal Cycling team’s faculty advisor, raced as a Cat 3 and placed 2nd!  Katrina Finley also got 2nd in the Women 3/4 field!  Congratulations to both Jerry and Katrina for giving the other half of Idaho a run for their money!