Florida State Championship series #7 / Coconut Cup series #3 –Caloosahatchee Trails – Alva, Fl
When hurricane Ian hit the Ft Myers area the thought that we would be racing at the Alva trails by November 20th was simply wishful thinking and frankly secondary to our concern for all of the folks that were affected by the storm. We were thinking the worst but to our surprise we got the call that club (the Mud Cutters) and the county (Lee County) was going to have the trails ready for the race and they did just that and in the nick of time, the trails were just opened on Friday the 18th. Open but not fully opened as the technical section called “Far East” still had water and tree damage which still gave the racers an 8.5 mile challenging course and near perfect conditions (I say near because the E MTB racers drew a short straw again with the weather and had some slick sections to deal with in the 1:30pm wave).
The event was both an FSC series and a Coconut cup series points paying event, so there was a lot at stake for the racers from the two series. The shorter and less technical trail lent itself to a fast pace and after three loops in the elite class it was Ryan Woodall once again coming out on top while in the women’s top class it was Crystal Pena taking her first win and also the lead in the series. So for the first time in the FSC series there was a new face on the Pemon Cycling wear leader’s jersey podium as Crystal joined veteran Ryan.
Team Leroy’s Lynx has pushed their team points total up to 40 now with only a couple points’ opportunities left in the FSC.
In the Gear Bicycle sales E MTB series race #5 it was last year’s champ Nick Mackie conquering the men’s expert while Kelly Jones continued on her winning ways to top the women’s. Ok this is starting to become a thing but some of the wet stuff showed up just in time for the E MTB race and once again the E folks had some slick stuff to deal with (especially on their last lap), not sure what is going on there but battery power seems to attract CO2.
Happy thanksgiving everyone and hope to you at the next event in Hialeah (CC#4 + TT both are FSC make ups) 12-3/4!
