Chris Butler: In the Books!!!

COMotion Sports 5x Regional Mountain Bike Champions!!!!!!

The last Mountain States Cup race has come and gone, and its official, COMotion Sports is the 5x regional Mtn. Bike Champions!!! The week leading up to the race was hectic, trying to manage to find time to get over and preride the course, and the drama of blowing up the rear shock on my bike on Thursday. Specialized was "suppose" to overnight me a new one for Friday delivery, and I could put it on and be ready for the short track XC race on Sat a.m., but they decided to ship it on Fri for Sat delivery. So I spent Friday afternoon calling every bike shop in the state to try and find a feasible XC race bike. Finally in Boulder I was able to rent a nice Yeti (one of the team sponsors!). One of my teammates Boni, was nice enought to drive up from Denver and pick it up for me and deliver to Keystone for me to race on Sat. Thanks again Boni, you are a lifesaver!!! Anyway, the overall points series for me was all wrapped up, so this weekends race was more about patronizing our team trailer than racing!

There was still some racing to be had, I suffered again in the short track on sat, and pretty much went for a leasurly bike ride during Sunday's cross country race. Motivation and fitness have been at bay for the past 2 weeks or so, so I was glad Sunday was over, and no more racing til 24 hours of Moab in Oct.

Joanna on the other hand was still in a points battle coming into the last race weekend, so she let her competitive side come out and decided to race her first short track race ever on Sat, "I need the Points!" She would say!!! She was on the edge for winning the overall beginner women 19-29 class, and by doing the short track pretty muched locked it up. So she mustered her courage and got out there and raced against all the sport women as well.

So here is the aftermath of all of our hard work, training, racing, & traveling all summer long!

(By the way, that is Mike Giem from CoMotion in 2nd overall with the Mexican Wrestling Mask on!)

Overall, a great first race season for both of us. We met a lot of really nice people, and being part of COMotion has added the "fun" element for both of us to racing. Nice to have people to hang out with after the race, the support of the team during the races, especially short track! Thanks to everyone, you all know who you are!!!!!! Here are some random pics..........

Hey nice Rental bike!!!!!

Here is Joanna and her friend Anita that she raced against all season. Joanna would beat her on the up hills, and Anita would catch her on the downhills. Guess we know what we need to work on for next season.