{"id":118468,"date":"2014-08-13T20:21:21","date_gmt":"2014-08-14T02:21:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/cyclists-contribute-to-escalante-days-fun\/"},"modified":"2014-08-13T20:21:21","modified_gmt":"2014-08-14T02:21:21","slug":"cyclists-contribute-to-escalante-days-fun","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/cyclists-contribute-to-escalante-days-fun\/","title":{"rendered":"Cyclists contribute to Escalante Days fun"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Racers
Racers head up the Dolores-Norwood Road on the way to Boggy Draw in the Escalante Days bike race.<\/span>Sam Green\/Cortez Journal<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Once a small-time race for local bike aficionados, the Escalante Days Mountain Bike Race has grown in recent years.<\/p>\n

Such growth was evident when 84 cyclists hailing from areas near and far showed up to compete in the event on Aug. 9.<\/p>\n

Racing under clear skies, several competitors took advantage of good track conditions to record some of the fastest times in race history.<\/p>\n

Leading the way was former U.S. Olympian and current Durango resident Travis Brown, who, competing in the Men\u2019s Expert Class, completed the 35-mile course in 1:53:59 to take top honors. Brown\u2019s time fell just short of Matt Shriver\u2019s course record time of 1:53:34.<\/p>\n

Had Brown beaten Shriver\u2019s time, he would have received an $800 prize reserved for a rider who breaks the record. Since the record was not broken this season, the prize will increase to $900 next year.<\/p>\n

Erich McAlister took second place in the Expert Men\u2019s Class (1:56:27), while Jens Nielson finished third (1:56:41).<\/p>\n

Setting the pace in the Women\u2019s Expert Class, Durango resident Bettina Mills raced ahead of the field to finish first ahead of Brianna Marshall and Emily Schaldach with a time of 2:16:44. Mills\u2019 result was somewhat surprising in light of her lack of racing experience.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m pretty new to racing and to mountain biking,\u201d said Mills, who has been biking for four years. \u201cI have to say that I was pretty excited to have done that well. The course was stunning, and it was really fast.\u201d<\/p>\n

Other finishers included Kirby Bryant, who finished first in the Men\u2019s Single Speed Expert Class (2:04:06) and Annie Bryant, who finished first in the Women\u2019s Single Speed Expert Class (2:40:15).<\/p>\n

Finishing first among those traversing the 21-mile sport course was Keiran Eagen (1:12:14), while Kolby Waltman and Mia Holden were the top finishers on the 13-mile beginner course.<\/p>\n

Offering an assessment of this year\u2019s races, Dolores Rotary Club president Laurel Rematore had nothing but good things to say.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe think it went great,\u201d said Rematore. \u201cIt was extremely competitive, and we were very fortunate. There were only some minor injuries.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Dolores Rotary Club said it will use funds from the year\u2019s race to support a variety of its programs, which projects in the U.S. and abroad.<\/p>\n

Looking ahead to next year, Rematore that while she hopes that the race will continue, that decision ultimately rests with the city of Dolores.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s up to the town of Dolores to ask (the Rotary Club) to continue to host the race,\u201d said Rematore.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re ready to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mountain bike race draws 84 competitors<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":118469,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6362],"tags":[188],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-118468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ds-sports","tag-dolores-star"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118468"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118468\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/118469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118468"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=118468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}