California, Colorado, Virgina hosting rounds of elite US series
Max Plaxton, Sid Taberlay and Todd Wells in an uphill breakaway (Image credit: Dave McElwaine/trailwatch.net)
The inaugural Triple Crown All Mountain Series will include three American mountain bike races for 2010, as announced by organizers on Friday. The series will kick off at Bonelli Park in California, on March 13-14, then move to Colorado to include the Mountain States Cup series at the Chalk Creek Stampede on May 15-16. It will wrap up with a final at Massanutten resort in Virginia on June 19-20. The series visits the East and West and the Rockies in between.
"We are excited to release our Triple Crown dates and venues to the public," said the US Cup Chairman Ty Kady. "We wanted to take into consideration all major UCI events and dates before we released the Triple Crown schedule. After reviewing the US ProXCT calendar released on USA Cycling's website two weeks ago, we felt we have made the public wait long enough for this announcement."
"The US Cup has also, as a show of support for the pro riders who are chasing Olympic berth, tentatively agreed to do our part by (also) hosting a UCI (category) 1 inscripted ProXCT event at Fontana (in California) on March 27-28, and feel good that we have established this series with minimal impact and overlap of existing events." said Tedro.
The news of the new series comes less than two weeks after the US Cup and USA Cycling parted ways and ended efforts to co-organizing the US ProXCT national series. The US ProXCT will go on, separate from the Triple Crown series, and will be run by USA Cycling and offer UCI points.
"The whole concept of the Triple Crown event is in conjunction with our partner promoters, incorporates three top tier venues and offers pro riders a substantial amount of prize money over US$35,000 in cash payouts... while still making it logistically possible to incorporate it with their existing race schedule." Payouts will go 10-deep in the pro category.
To make the events more appealing to sponsors, riders and the media, organizers are incorporating a cross country, super D and short track. "A rider's best two of three events will be calculated to crown a winner at each race and ultimately the overall series champion."
In addition to the 10-deep payout, with bonus bucks for the top 10 men and women at each event if certain field numbers are met, any male or female rider who can sweep all three events will go home with an additional US$2,000.
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The series is backed by H2O Overdrive, Specialized, Kenda, KMC Chains, GU, John Wayne Cancer foundation among others.
2010 Triple Crown All Mountain Series March 13-14: Bonelli Park, California May 15-16: Mountain States Cup at Chalk Creek, Colorado June 19-20: Massanutten Hoo Ha!, Virginia
Sue George is an editor at Cyclingnews. She coordinates all of the site's mountain bike race coverage and assists with the road, 'cross and track coverage.
