Durango’s Bailey Cioppa and Ivan Sippy beat the weather and the competition in Grand Junction on Thursday at the USA Cycling Collegiate Mountain Bike National Championships.
Cioppa, racing for Fort Lewis College, and Sippy, racing for Colorado Mesa University, and the rest of the competitors had a quicker turnaround in between races because of weather concerns in Grand Junction. A lot quicker.
The incoming storms made the organizers have the short track, cross-country and team relay races all in the same day at Powderhorn Mountain Resort. Sippy did the best with the quick turnaround and won the male varsity short track and the male varsity cross-country national championships.
Cioppa’s decision to take off the final round of the UCI Mountain Bike World Cup paid off as she won the female varsity cross-country national championship.
“My cross-country was honestly pretty surprising,” Cioppa said. “I didn't really expect to win by that much, but I knew that my fitness was good enough to win, so I was excited. The course suited me really well. It's just a pretty long road climb and a single track descent … I'm pretty tired. It's been a long season and I accomplished everything I wanted to this year early on. My win yesterday (Thursday) was for Fort Lewis and for our coaches.”
Cioppa, a junior at FLC, finished the cross-country race in one hour, 12 minutes and four seconds. She was 3:11 ahead of her close friend and Bear National Team teammate Makena Kellerman, riding for Colorado Mesa, in second. Elisabeth Knight was third and finished 4:28 behind Cioppa.
The Durangoan steadily increased her lead throughout the race and that she had an advantage on the climbs against Kellerman.
Although Cioppa thought she couldn’t battled Kellerman for the short track title if Cioppa didn’t flat, she was happy to see herself and her close friend bring home titles.
Sippy, a senior, easily won the short track race, finishing in 18:40, nine seconds ahead of his Colorado Mesa teammate Colin O’Neil. In the cross-country race, Sippy dominated and won in 1:09:56, 2:06 ahead of Brevard College’s Owen Clark. Fellow Durangoan and freshman Colorado Mesa rider Kai Lokey finished fourth and 2:48 behind Sippy.
One local national champion who didn’t escape the weather was FLC’s Austin Beard. He battled the wet conditions in the male varsity downhill race and won the national championship in 6:51.509, 16.62 seconds ahead of Brevard College’s Matthew Leliveld.
The downhill course was shortened to cut out the lower portion of it because of the trail conditions and the lack of time with the national championships condensed into less days, according to Burnett.
“They definitely got the weather right, knew that weather was coming and told you,” FLC cycling director Ian Burnett said about the race organizers. “They did do their best with just kind of balancing courses and course conditions and all those things. They put a lot of effort into making it all happen. It was the best-case scenario (with Beard). I think Carson could have done really well with any of the courses, but it worked out in his favor.”
Behind Beard in the male varsity downhill was Caleb Haack in fifth in 7:18.349. Haack was the only other male Skyhawk to finish on a podium on Thursday or Friday. Sophomore Elliot Thornblade finished seventh in the short track, 1:26 behind Sippy, and was the top Skyhawk male in 10th in the cross-country race, 7:42 behind Sippy.
Burnett said Thornblade was a good surprise and complimented him on his consistency.
“It was an up-and-down day,” Burnett said. “We opened up with Emmett (McManus) getting a flat in the short track was which was a bummer, but we kind of made up for it. We had a good amount of boys race in the afternoon. We still had pretty solid team results overall, which was exciting to still pull off with losing a lot of our kids to the World Cup.”
On the women’s side, sophomore Hayden Bevington finished fourth in the female varsity downhill. Bevington finished in 8:30.578, 23.82 seconds behind Colorado’s Mesa’s Maylei Leaneagh in first. Maiya Blanchard finished fifth in the cross-country race, 6:14 behind Cioppa. Blanchard was also FLC’s top finisher in the short track in 12th.
“They did amazing,” FLC women’s cycling head coach Brittany Cowan said. “Three endurance events in one day is a pretty remarkable feat in itself and one to remember.”
bkelly@durangoherald.com
