Otis Lyons 's Blog (7)

The best weekend of the year started off with a few bumps. Arriving Thursday night, it wasn't until the following morning, just before the pre-ride of the descent, that I would put in new brake pads for both the front and rear.



After pre-riding, that night we realized something was up with my brakes, and, after tracking down seemingly everyone in the town, ended up being saved by a Shimano rep and a worker at the local bike shop.



Unbelievably, at about 7 or 8 the night…

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My first race after state championships in May came two months later, an unusually long time to go without competing.



What's more, it wasn't even on my mountain bike, but my first road race ever, in the famed Cat 5 category.



I lined up with 25 other riders, 20 of whom didn't have to go through the travails of junior gearing- I had to race without my four hardest gears, making it tough on the descents to keep up with the massively geared masters and middle aged Cat 5… Continue

It was good to finally be able to do the states' biggest cycling event, after waiting at the side lines the previous years.

Going into the event, I had seen the start list and realized the field was absolutely stacked, despite this being only a cat 2 race. With kids such as the cx national champion (Ben Gomez Villafane), the JV D1 NorCal leader (Tyler Sargent), and my friend from San Marin who is tied for the series lead in Freshmen D2,…

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This was to be my first race in an Acme jersey- I didn't know what to expect in a junior field consisting of who knows who. It was different then a NorCal race, where I knew exactly who I would be competing against.

Preriding the course an hour before was good- if I hadn't, I may not have realized that walking my bike in places was more beneficial then trying to ride.

The race started and I was in the first row on the inside. The fire road hole shot to the start of the…

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Well, here we go again! With one race under the belt, going into the weekend I felt good, but I didn't want to perceive this as overconfidence. I was glad to have the race be on a Saturday this time- not only to get out of school early, but also for an earlier race, and a fresher course.

I did two laps the day before, and liked the way the course looked, all the way up until the end, where they incorporated a new weird cyclocross-like Z into a sand pit. Oh well. So, I decided that I didn't… Continue

Fort Ord- NorCal #1 3/6/16



I could start this race report from when I was a sixth grader, watching my brother in his first race as a freshman for the Drake MTB team. But, the boring anticipation for the next three years would fill up the Bible, so I'll skip straight to the most exciting and nerve racking moments.

The 5 mile lap never fluctuated more than 100 feet or so in elevation, and I didn't think that a rider like me, who thrives on long climbs, would survive such a…

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