MTB Racers zoom through Rockabilly Ridge Race

Steve Smail
After drenching rains on Friday and Saturday, the sandy Rockabilly Ridge course luckily dried out for the Mountain Bike Team’s second race at Pugh Bourne Park trails just outside of Jackson, TN. Inspired by Sunday's near-perfect trail conditions and high 70s temperatures making for a superb and sunny racing day, 2 dozen USN mountain bikers dug deep and showed significant gains typically riding 2 or 3 3-mile laps.
Some Race #2 highlights:
  • 24 MS and HS racers competed for USN
  • The MS squad placed 9th and improved to 10th  place overall out of 27 middle school teams.
  • The HS squad placed 18th and improved to 18th place overall out of 28 high school teams.
  • Freshman Allen Chen posted the team’s fastest lap and 3-lap race time of the day.
  • Ella Murdoch and Elsa Absi both placed in the top 10 of their categories.
 
For the HS, strong performances from Elsa Absi, Adeline Miller, Sylvie Mackler and Allen Chen buoyed the team’s points. Absi posted 2 sub-23 minute laps coming in 8th. Miller powered through 3 laps for a great 72 minute effort, Mackler with consistent 24-minute laps, and Chen riding 3 sub-20-minute laps including the team’s fastest lap of the day at 18:51 and also posting the fastest 3-lap time time for the team. 
Claire Dehner, Brianna Castro, Clio Cherry-Pulay and Arianna Washington all raced 2 full laps, each with remarkably consistent lap times. Avery Savona and Charlie Blau both posted 3-lap races under an hour, with Savona’s lap times all within 10 seconds of each other, while Blau was on pace with Savona until some hiccups during his 3rd lap slowed him down, but only by a minute (and 8 minutes faster than his race a year ago). Caden Carrabba, Aidan Harris, and Seth Hauser also posted super-consistent lap times for 62 to 69 minute 3-lap races. Charlie McNulty pulled out a 20 minute first lap before slowing on his 2nd, and Basil Broemel arrived at the finish in just over 60 minutes, improving 7 minutes compared to his 2024 time. The consistency and improvements of this deep high school squad sets them up well for the remainder of the season.
 
On the MS side, team points were collected by Ella Murdoch, Rosie Hauser, Sarah Absi and Emmett Cheney. Murdoch and Absi posted mid-30s single lap races, with Hauser taking on 2 laps in 49 minutes and Cheney 2 laps in 46 minutes. 8th grader Barry Chen let loose and posted a negative split set of laps (2nd lap faster than the first), with the 2nd lap of 19:33. James Barbieri, James White, Julian Sevin-Scheutz and Vincent van Zandt all posted solid laps in the 23 to 27 minute range.
 
With the team hitting its stride for fitness, endurance and skills, our 3rd race will be a great one to watch, and is our closest race in Gallatin, TN on Sunday, September 21st.
 
Full details for Race 2 can be found here: https://tennesseemtb.org/events/results/
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