So MLT had it’s championship round in Charlotte yesturday. It also included an individual super sprint championship before the MTR finale. Vincent Luis showed up racing in both races, and the pros put on a great show. I’ve seen first hand big improvements in both the racing and the the general vibe of the event in just 1 year time (MLT charlotte hosted a race in May 2017).
The individual race sprint championship was beautifully executed with Luis, Seth Rider dropping Ben Kanute on the bike and then Rider going for broke on the 1 mile technical tough run (the uphill stretch coming out of a dead turn defintely factored into the speed of the race). He was eventually passed by Luis, and most interesting development of the race was seeing Tyler Mislawchuk storm through the course to have a sprint finish against Kanute for 2nd. Rider who animiated the hell out of the race had to settle for 4th.
In the MTR, Kanute’s team steadily took it to the relay giving Kanute a 30s lead coming off the bike vs hard charging Luis racing for Florida Sun (was given penalty for Luis racking bike improperly) , Rider for San Diego and Mislawchuk for Arizona Kingsnakes.
1st- Carolina Gliders
2nd- Arizona Kingsnakes
3rd- San Diego Stingrays
Overall Standings for the year:
1st- Carolina Gliders
2nd- SD Stingrays
3rd- Arizona Kingsnakes
Things I loved about the series is that the racing and caliber of athletes is improving. This is getting filled with more WTS caliber athletes over time. Video coverage on FB live. Top commentary from the likes of Barrie Shepley and good insights with color commentary from different athlete/coach prospectives over the 4 race series. The bike course this year was brilliant and had them coming in front of the crowds every few minutes. It was a technical enough course that you could do some drafting but it was also hard enough that you better work to hold those wheels (Kanute lost the front break).
Major congrats to Daniel Cassidy and his crew. They’ve worked hard to improve the series, put in a ton of time and energy into this. The racing is improving, the athletes are fighting harder and harder and are really buying into this team concept. I think it was Chelsea Burns who talked about how this team format is really athlete driven and centered over the itu format of it being federation driven. So hopefully it can bring more and more quality into the format.