One national champion and a pair of runners-up for the Skyhawks, who are one day from a ninth consecutive national title on their mountain bikes.
Rebecca Gardner captured the women’s downhill championship, Adam Digby was second in the men’s downhill, and a pair of Fort Lewis College women went 2-3 in the cross country race to pace FLC cycling on Day 2 of the USA Cycling Collegiate Mountain Bike National Championships on Saturday in Beech Mountain, N.C.
The Skyhawks lead the team omnium over Lees-McCrae with one day remaining as FLC closes in on its 19th national title overall. The final events Sunday are the team relay and the men’s and women’s dual slalom.
FLC’s Sofia Gomez Villafane leads the women’s omnium with 310 points, with Wyoming’s Linnea Dixson in second with 267.
FLC’s Michael Sampson is third in the men’s omnium, well behind Kerry Werner of Lees-McCrae, who has a lead of 211 over teammate and second-place rider Gunnar Bergey.
Gardner won the downhill in 2 minutes, 58.418 seconds, a little more than 22 seconds better than runner-up Shayona Glynn of Marian. FLC’s Sage Kitson was fifth, Villafane seventh, Meghan Kane ninth and Brittany Clawson 10th.
Digby finished in 2:26.279, less than a second behind champion Alex Dawson of Appalachian State. Zach Graveson was the next Skyhawk across the line in ninth, followed by Brian White in 20th, Phil Cowan in 31st and Michael Sampson in 41st.
Lauren Catlin finished second and Villafane third for the Skyhawks behind Stanford’s Kate Courtney in the Division I race, with Catlin just five seconds off the pace in 1 hour, 6 minutes, 34 seconds.
Clawson was 23rd, followed by Kitson in 24th and Elizabeth Schwab in 27th for the Skyhawks.
Payson McElveen set the tone for FLC in the men’s cross country event, finishing eighth in 1:27:12 in a race won by Colorado’s Chris Baddick. Durango’s Sepp Kuss was third for the Buffaloes in 1:23:03.
Sampson was 10th for FLC, followed by Stephan Davoust in 13th and Garrett Lundberg in 19th.
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