Team Celebrates at NorCal Finals (Photo: Marin IJ)
The Drake Mountain Bike Team successfully defended out NorCal Championship title this weekend by defeating the competitive teams of Redwood and Salinas and eleven other Division 1 teams at Stafford Lake in Novato on Sunday May 6th.
Most of the team riders peaked at the perfect time and recorded personal best places for the season. All but one of the points earning members were on the podium for the day including Freshman Allie Jo Stanley 5th, Freshman Carson Benjamin 2nd (also won the top freshman boy for the year), Freshman Ben Enbom 4th, Sophomore Nicolette Lax 4th, Junior Leah Lind-White 3rd, Senior Libby Caldwell 6th, Junior Lucas Newcomb 4th, and Senior Mackenzie Stanley, who had her best finish of the year, winning the very competitive Varsity Girls group! Some of these categories have 60-80 riders in them!
Drake is now the 6x NorCal High School Mountain Bike League Champions! Great job to the whole team!
Now we’re off to the State Championships in two weeks (5/20/12) to take on the Southern California teams for the California State Championship. We go very confident that we’ll defend our title and make it four State Championships for the team!
Thanks to all those who came out to support the team, it meant a lot to the students.
~ Roll Pirates!!!!
Thanks to Pedal Born Pictures for the great video!
Well that was one heck of a weekend! I am just now getting myself back together from the exileration of it all. Looks like “Having fun and doing your best” was a good idea seeing as how despite a couple of hiccups, that was our best race of the season. I don’t have specifics as yet while waiting for the results posting, but I do believe there were something like 19 season bests or equivelants including a couple of first time podium standers, congradulations Ben and Nicolette!
Laguna Seca Podium 4/1/2012
Even though they are painful, those Fish-Els really paid off. You have all worked hard at practice and it is really showing at the races. If we can keep this up and catch a break in the misfortune of some of our top riders, we may be able to come back against Redwood. They had a Drake MTB kind of day and we will really need to be on our game to catch them. This is one of the closest 1-2-3 season battles I have been through but this is a typical Drake MTB kind of year where we come on strong at the end of the season. Again, I am very proud of you and inspired by your enthusiasm.
We will be having practice on Tuesdays going forward starting tomorrow. All practices during the week will be at 4PM. Be sure and check the calendar if you have any questions. We will also be having practice this Sunday which happens to be Easter. The Church of Drake MTB will be open at 9AM with our traditional EasterTube hunt with perhaps a few goodies thrown in as well.
We only have less than 2 weeks to get ready for Boggs so there will be an extra dose of single track in the weeks to come as well as some more climbing in preparation for “The Wall” at Boggs. We will also be takling a poll for the Spring Break week prior to Boggs to see how many want to practice or ride on their own or who will even be in town that week.
April 1, 2012, at 1:13 am - Stowed under: Fundraisers
A $50,000 challenge grant has been offered by Marin County Supervisors Judy Arnold and Steve Kinsey to support the Stafford Lake Bike Park, and Drake MTB is rising to the challenge!
The Stafford Lake Bike Park is a project of the Marin County Department of Parks and Open Space. The 17 acre bike park site will be located within Stafford Lake County Park in Novato. The bike park will provide a wide range of cyclists with opportunities to learn to ride and build safe riding skills.
Over 85% of Drake MTB riders, families and sponsors have donated as of May 1, 2012 — why not join us?
Howdy! Now that the dust has settled, turns out we actually placed 3rd in Race 2 and are still 1st overall, barely! Way to go Pirates! ~ Coach Paul
From Coach Dan
Howdy all, while the NorCal team point totals did not equal that of our first race, here are some stats that will please the Pirates:
23 of 36 racers at Race #2 had their personal best performances of the season — fabulous!
The average score per rider at Race #1 was 363.92. At Race #2 it was 370.97 — outstanding! A 7-point increase average is great progress!
ALL the frosh girls, frosh boys, and soph girls who did Race #1 improved their performance in Race #2 – amazing!
Best overall improvement over Race #1 goes to Sterling Guy with 24 places (35th to 11th) — Superhuman!
Congrats to Oliver Morgen! His 10th and 452 points put him on the list of NorCal Team point scorers!!! – Way to go, Oliver!
Think about your own highlights…we’d love to hear from you! Roll Pirates! ~ Coach Dan
From Coach Jeff:
It was a rough weekend with the weather, but a successful weekend on the course for the Drake Mountain Bike Team. Each race the points from the top eight riders from each team are added together to determine the team results for the day. At our second race of the season, held in Monterey, the team, just like true Pirates, weathered the major rain storms, painful hail, and biting wind to add another successful day to their season. Thanks to the top riders of Lucas Newcomb, Miles Lim, Mackenzie Stanley, Libby Caldwell, Leah Lind-White, Oliver Morgen, Carson Benjamin, and Allie Jo Stanley, the team would once again move closer to a 4th state championship for 2012. Great job Pirates! And thanks to the parents and coaches, who, as Sam McLaughlin put it, built a “fortress in the pits,” for the team to stay dry and warm. Roll Pirates!
Here’s a compilation of recaps, race reports and more from Granite Bay this past weekend where we came in #2 by just 9 points in first by 55 points over #2 San Rafael!!
Results at NorCalMTB.org
[UPDATED 2/29/12 - WE WON!]
![Sophia Hamilton At Worlds [VIDEO]](http://www.drakemtb.org/wp-content/plugins/special-recent-posts/lib/phpimage.php?width=100&height=150&rotation=no&file=L2hvbWUvdmcwMDF3ZWIwMi8wNS8wOC8zMDAwODA1L3dlYi93cC1jb250ZW50L3VwbG9hZHMvMjAxMC8wOS9TY3JlZW4tc2hvdC0yMDExLTA5LTE5LWF0LTExLjM0LjQwLUFNLnBuZw==)
![Thanks To Our 2009 Tamarancho “Spooky” 1000 Donors!!! [VIDEO]](http://www.drakemtb.org/wp-content/plugins/special-recent-posts/lib/phpimage.php?width=100&height=150&rotation=no&file=L2hvbWUvdmcwMDF3ZWIwMi8wNS8wOC8zMDAwODA1L3dlYi93cC1jb250ZW50L3VwbG9hZHMvMjAwOS8xMi9TY3JlZW4tc2hvdC0yMDExLTA5LTE5LWF0LTExLjQwLjE0LUFNLnBuZw==)
![2009 Drake MTB Coaches’ Retreat [VIDEO]](http://www.drakemtb.org/wp-content/plugins/special-recent-posts/lib/phpimage.php?width=100&height=150&rotation=no&file=L2hvbWUvdmcwMDF3ZWIwMi8wNS8wOC8zMDAwODA1L3dlYi93cC1jb250ZW50L3VwbG9hZHMvMjAwOS8xMC9TY3JlZW4tc2hvdC0yMDExLTA5LTE5LWF0LTEyLjQzLjEwLVBNLnBuZw==)