National Championships Day 4: Collegiate and Singlespeed Titles Awarded

Cyclocross Magazine is in Kansas City doing live coverage of the races along with posting daily reports and photo galleries, while even trying to do a bit of racing ourselves. Day 4’s collegiate and singlespeed reports are below. Also see our live coverage archive, Day 1, Day 2, Day 3 reports along with our Men’s race and Women’s race reports from Day 4 of the 2008 Cyclocross National Championships from Kansas City.

by USA Cycling, photos by Larry Rosa, Joe Sales, and Andrew Yee

The USA Cycling Collegiate Cyclocross team and individual titles were awarded in two categories – Division I (D1) and. With a tie amongst the top two schools in DI, Fort Lewis College and Lees-McRae College, the team title came down to the highest placing of the day by an individual rider from that institution. That meant Carla Swart’s (Banner Elk, N.C./Lees-McRae) gold-medal performance in the women’s race broke the tie and handed the Bobcats the win over their Colorado rivals.

Swart, now a collegiate national champion in all four disciplines, was closely shadowed by last year’s second-place-finisher Amanda Miller (Fort Collins, Colo./Colorado State University). Ultimately Miller had to settle for another silver, finishing in front of Lindsey Wilson’s Ashley James (Delafield, Wis.) who grabbed the bronze. Fort Lewis’ top finisher, Teal Stetson Lea (Durango, Colo.) was fourth.

The DI men’s race saw Will Dugan (Burlington, Mass./University of Vermont) surge from the back row to pull in his first Stars-and-Stripes. Dugan was able to hold off the reigning collegiate cross country mountain bike national champion, Benjamin Sonntag (Durango, Colo./Fort Lewis College) and his partner in an early race break, Eric Thompson (Shoreview, Minn./Lees-McRae College) to win the national title. The DI team podium wrapped up with Lindsey Wilson College in third, Colorado State University in fourth and Indiana’s Marian College in fifth.

In Division II, Appalachian State, with a balanced attack from both men and women, was able to take home the team title by just ten points over the United States Military Academy. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology finished third while Western Washington University was fourth.

USA Cycling Mountain Bike Development Team member and former collegiate mountain bike national champion Colin Cares (Colorado Springs, Colo./Colorado College) took home the DII men’s title over Mesa State’s Kevin Mullervy (Littleton, Colo.) and Steve Fisher of Western Washington University (Bellingham, Wash.). Former collegiate road champ Devon Haskell (Chicago, Ill./University of Chicago) earned the DII women’s title in commanding fashion while MIT’s Katherine Harris (Somerville, Mass.) grabbed the silver.

In the non-national championship single-speed race, James Lalonde (Madison, Wis./Ellis Cycles) rode to the win over a mixed field of more than 50 riders, keeping the non-title win within the family, after his older brother Mark won it last year.

Day Four National Champions:

Winners:

• Collegiate Men Division I: Will Dugan (Burlington, Mass./University of Vermont)
• Collegiate Women Division I: Carla Swart (Banner Elk, N.C./Lees-McRae College)Collegiate Men
• Division II: Colin Cares (Colorado Springs, Colo./Colorado College)
• Collegiate Women Division II: Devon Haskell (Chicago, Ill./University of Chicago)
• Singlespeed winner: James Lalonde (Madison, Wis./Ellis Cycles)

Photo Gallery:

Full Results: