The Galena Growlers pose for a team photo, featuring bikers, coaches, and volunteers, at the NICA Championships. The Growlers finished seventh on the 2023 season. Congratulations on a great season. (Submitted Photo)

OLD FORGE- Over the weekend, the Galena Growlers composite Middle/High School mountain bike team traveled up to McCauley Mountain Mountain Bike Park in Old Forge for the New York Cross Country Mountain Bike State Championships. This was the fifth and final NICA New York League mountain bike race for the 2023 Spring Season.

Head Coach Rob Baker exclaimed, “I can’t be more proud of these kids!! It was a roller coaster of emotions this weekend in Old Forge as the Growlers 2023 season came to an end knowing we had two seniors racing their last NICA race. Race five was our best race weekend of the season and the McCauley Mountain race venue delivered a great weekend for our State Championships – we again had great weather and a state championship course that was a little short, but really challenging at the same time!”

The Growlers brought home just one podium from the race, experienced zero DNFs, and the high school team ended up in sixth place out of 20 teams in the NY Championship race. The course was a tough one, with a challenging climb that turned into a crazy fast descent down the “Food Fight” trail with lots of huge berms, twists and rocks. It was a great day of racing for the 229 kids from the 20 competing NICA NY teams.

In the season overall results, the Growlers also came away with one rider on the season overall podium, which was Drew Brooks, who finished fourth overall for the varsity boys.

The Growlers had a total of eight kids racing on the weekend, consisting of four middle school and four high school racers. All eight Growlers finished and had a blast in the final race of the NICA season.

Sixth grader McKenzie Hagenbuch, grabbed another podium (her second on the season) with a hard-fought fourth place finish racing three laps on the 2.35 mile course that had an immediate uphill climb from the start.

The middle school kids raced the same course the high schoolers raced, having to climb the mountain three times for a total of three laps. In the middle school races, Amon Oliver had a great race finishing in 12th place. Sixth grader Malakai Hagenbuch finished in 10th place after a crash and bike technical issues in his three-lap race.

Aside from McKenzie, sixth grader Margaret Kemnah had a tough race finishing in 10th after a crash on lap one. Baker said, “Margaret’s tough, a farm girl. The best part of her race is that she got back on the bike and finished her race!”

For the high school team, which uses team scoring of the best scores from your top four riders, the Growlers only had four riders racing in the State Championships.

“We crossed our fingers that all four high schoolers would have clean races and finish and they did! All four Growlers at the high school level had great races,” Baker said.

Drew Brooks just missed a podium finish in sixth place in the varsity boys’ six-lap race. In the JV girls’ race, Emma Brooks raced to an eighth place finish in her tough five-lap race.

In the sophomore boys’ race, Growlers Braedon Baker and Alex Kemnah had tremendous races and finished in sixth and seventh respectively with Braedon just missing the podium. Those two went back and forth throughout their four-lap race on the mountain and worked together like great teammates do.

“The four-rider high school team raced to a sixth place team finish in the State Championships. All our Growler coaches are so proud of all our kids that raced and finished at McCauley,” Baker added. “If you’ve never mountain biked at McCauley, it’s got every type of trail and the trails are so much fun – but most of the fun is earned by climbing to the top of the mountain! It’s even got a mountain bike skills park like the one Norwich hopes to have created here for the kids locally.”

The team’s four scorers on the day, totaling 2093 points, were Drew Brooks with 576 points, Emma Brooks with 524 points, Braedon Baker with 501 points, and Alex Kemnah with 492 points.

Overall, the Growlers finished the 2023 Spring Season in seventh place with 9,588 points accumulated on the season after the State Championships.

Baker finished by saying, “Sadly, our Growlers Spring 2023 NICA season has come to a close. We had a wonderful season with lots of great practices and five wonderful races all around New York. We had lots of adventures and all the kids grew so much over the course of our six-month season. We definitely grew strong bodies, strong minds and strong characters this year! We will now get a little rest, and soon we’ll be holding some weekly rides up on the West Hill Quarry trails. These rides will be open to everyone and we’d love to get more people out riding the Quarry trails! We also plan on doing trail maintenance regularly and would love all the help we could get.”

The Growlers truly appreciate all the community support here in the Norwich area. Thank you to all our wonderful team sponsors. Thank you to the parents, our wonderful coaching staff. Most importantly, thank you to our wonderful kids that are helping us get #MoreKidsOnBikes! It’s a lifelong sport that they’ll hopefully take with them through life!

If you have a child interested in mountain biking with us and want to know more about the Galena Growlers contact Head Coach Rob Baker at GalenaGrowlers@gmail.com.

-Information from the Galena Growlers

NY State Championships Race 5 Results

Middle School:

Sixth grade boys – Malakai Hagenbuch (#5006) had bike technical (shifting) issues: finished in 10th place.

Sixth grade girls - McKenzie Hagenbuch (#6009) with a fourth place podium finish

Margaret Kemnah (#6013) in 10th place.

Eighth grade boys – Amon Oliver (#1007) in 12th place

High School:

Sophomore boys - (#422) Braedon Baker, finishing in sixth place. (#428) Alex Kemnah, finishing in seventh place.

JV girls- Emma Brooks (#302) finished in eighth place. Once again, Emma was the team’s second points scorer! She is also the Valedictorian of the Class of 2023 at Norwich High School.

Varsity boys- Drew Brooks (#100) finished his six-lap race with a sixth place finish. Drew ended his season in fourth place overall for the Varsity Boys.