MISSOULA — The Missoula Pro XC mountain biking race wrapped up at Marshall Mountain on Sunday.
While the professional riders were completing the four legs of their elite race, there were also some of the best youth riders in the nation looking to bring home some hardware.
In the girls short course race, it was Maggie Holcomb from Durango, Colorado crushing the race and finishing with a winning time of 20:39.27.
“I guess their riding here is really fun. It’s kind of different than Durango. I guess it’s more like southwestern Colorado, like drier, more desert. And here there are a lot of trees and mountains, which there are in Durango, but it’s just a different experience,” Holcomb said. “It’s always fun to just go out there and have a good time. And if you win that’s awesome, if you don’t it’s still awesome to be on your bike. I’m pretty happy with how I did. I mostly just didn’t want to get left by the boys, which I was happy I didn’t. It was close.”
In the boys short circuit it was 14-year-old Sammy Walker with the Lake Washington Velo team winning with a blazing time of 17:57.39 to complete those seven laps.
“I wasn’t feeling the best-made a race, but then I started ramping it back up again and had a great race,” Walker said. “It’s definitely something else: You go get to see new places and ride in different elevations, different terrains. You know, I’ve gone to see Autre and Utah and stuff like that, and it’s great for experience getting to know all these other kids out here and stuff like that and do all these really fun races all around.”
