October 26, 2016 at 1:24 p.m.
Rhinelander/Northwoods mountain bike team concludes season
Hodags finish 7th in final WHSCL standings
Rhinelander/Northwoods mountain bike team concludes season
The club team, comprised of athletes from Rhinelander, Lakeland, Tomahawk and Three Lakes, finished in the top quarter of all high school teams in the season-long standings, quite an accomplishment for the fledgling team.
"It went probably better than I ever expected," RNC coach Joel Flory said. "No. 1 we got numbers at least as high or higher than I expected. We had a bunch of great kids."
"The kids not only performed well on the race course, but (they were) standup citizens in the pit zone," he added.
The Hodags turned in a number of strong performances Sunday, led by Bridger Flory who finished second in the sophomore boys' division with a two-lap time of 52 minutes, 47 seconds. Johanna Craig finished third in the freshman girls' division (1:05:14), Alexis Pyrchalla was fourth in the sophomore girls' race (1:08:58) and Freddy Wisner took 22nd in the sophomore boys' division.
RNC had three finishers in the JV boys' race: Luke Bodewes in 16th, Hunter Bachmann in 39th and Garrett Bachmann in 48th.
"I think everybody had a decent race," coach Flory said. "Hunter Bachmann had a bang-up race. He had a great race (Sunday). Those guys go a long ways, three laps. They're out there riding for a hour and a half as hard as they can and Hunter had a great race. That was really, really neat to see.
"A lot of our riders finished pretty much where they have been. Johanna and Jakob from Tomahawk, they came in where they normally did. Luke Bodewes had a good JV race."
The Hodags scored three top-five finishes in the middle school classes. Jakob Craig won the seventh-grade boys' race, completing one lap of the Iola course in 29:22. Megan Lester was third in the seventh-grade girls' race and Bella Johnson finished fifth in the sixth-grade girls' race.
"Megan from Three Lakes had a good seventh-grade race. Bella Johnson, who was added to our roster not that long ago, she did well again and was on the podium," Flory noted.
The team ended the season with five riders in the top 10 in points in their respective classes. Bridger Flory was second overall in the sophomore boys' division; Pyrchalla and Johanna Craig with third in the sophomore and freshman girls' divisions; Emma Hjelle finished seventh in sophomore girls and Bodewes finished 10th in JV boys. The final standings factored in the best three finishes for each rider during the four-race season and included a 25-point bonus for riders who competed in all four races.
Joel Flory said the team's performance in the younger divisions plus the continual effort to get the word out about the sport to kids across the Northwoods should bode well for the club entering 2017.
"Year 2, I think, is going to be interesting. I think we had a lot of interest in the team about mid-season from other people," he said. "Those people are already on the email list for 2017. I can envision the team growing a lot and the other thing is we have a ton of kids on the podium at younger age levels that are going to continue - the way they are riding now, there's no doubt in my mind - to excel. As they get to sophomore, junior varsity and varsity range, they are going to garner a lot of points for this team and Rhinelander's going to be a real force to contend with for years to come."
As for 2016, Flory said a couple of things stood out.
"I think it's a unique opportunity that provides kids the chance to do it on the side (while competing in other sports) and that's the way we want the program to say. We want to be open-armed and let anybody who wants to come ride do it," he said. "I'd like to mention the fantastic support we got from the community - whether it was RASTA or Nicolet National Bank - there were people who stepped up to help us get what we needed to get through this first year and we'll pay back where we can, for sure."
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
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