Tornado Cyclists Finish Second in Road Debut (March 3-4, 2007)
The Brevard College Cycling Team debuted in collegiate road racing this past weekend at Georgia Southern University in Statesboro, GA.
The race weekend consisted of a Saturday individual road race and team time trial followed by a Sunday individual critereium.
Although it was the first road racing experience for many team members, they scored strongly in their respective categories and showed dedication by turning around three hours after a 53-mile road race to finish second in the men’s B, four-man team time trial, covering the 16.5 mile course in 43:54.08
Strong finishes in the road race included three top ten finishes in men’s B with Matt Wells, Aaron Motley, and Matt Jones finishing a respective 7th, 9th, and 10th.
Nan Pugh added a sixth place finish in the women’s B group. Also notable was Kyle Willis who broke into the top ten with a ninth place in the 60+ racers men’s C field.
Georgia Tech – March 10-11 2007
In Sunday’s criterium, Matt Jones had the strongest showing of the weekend. Exerting 45 minutes of maximum effort to bring back the early breakaways, Jones held on for a strong fifth place finish and scored points in three of the races’ intermediate sprints. Pugh continued her success with a seventh place finish in the women’s C criterium.
Second year head coach Thad Walker, who started up the mountain bike team last fall, expressed pride in the team’s efforts, despite the difference in venues.
“We don’t have a lot of experience, but there is a lot of enthusiasm on the team,” Walker said. “They’re big on learning and getting exposed to road racing. This year we are just trying to get our program established and recruit cyclists who want to come to Brevard College.”
Even though Brevard College is joining the South Atlantic Conference, they only one of the few schools fielding a cycling team. Mars Hill is in the process of beginning a program, Walker said.
The Brevard College Cycling team will travel to Newnan, GA., this weekend to compete in two road races hosted by Georgia Tech.
Road cycling is often thought of as a team sport. A team works together to support its strongest rider, working at the front of the peleton to block the wind and stay out of crashes, chasing down breakaways, and making sure their leader is in a position to win. One individual is only as strong as the team around them. A senior in the Wilderness Leadership and Experiential Education major at Brevard College, Nan Pugh is a team of one. All of her other nine teammates are male, yet she outscores them in most every race.
This past weekend, the cycling team traveled to Newnan, Georgia, to compete in two road races hosted by Georgia Tech. Pugh finished 4th on Saturday’s rolling course with an uphill finish. On Sunday, Pugh came back to finish 6th among the B women’s field. “Nan is new to road cycling but she is a hard-worker and displays a tremendous amount of both optimism and dedication to the team and the college community,” said Brevard College Cycling head coach Thad Walker.
Collegiate cycling is a unique sport. While men and women are scored separately in nearly every other sport, collegiate cycling combines both the men’s and women’s points -which are weighted equally- to give each team an overall score. Since far fewer women than men partake in the sport, a group of strong female racers can carry an entire collegiate team to nationals. Brevard College Cycling is striving to build a well-balanced program that recognizes the importance of women in the sport by encouraging women to participate and seeking funding that would allow the program to buy women’s specific bicycles. The program aspires to grant more women the opportunity to become involved in competitive cycling as well as to foster a lifelong interest in health-orientated activities. |