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NorCal HS MTB League vs. USA Cycling categories?
Thu, 03/24/2011 - 9:58am
Not sure if this should go in MTB or Juniors. I'll start here in MTB. :)
My daughter races Varsity in the NorCal High School MTB League. These are not USA Cycling races, but it's where tons of junior cross country racing action happens.
If she were to place high enough at the state championship race -- actually a qualifier for USA Cycling XC Nats -- they map that Varsity result to Cat 1 / expert Nationals qualification.
Meanwhile, she's interested in racing other, non-NorCal XC qualifiers, like Sea Otter, to try to assure her spot at Nats. USA Cycling has her as Cat 2, since she doesn't have official USA Cycling XC results for a USA Cycling upgrade. (She does have four top-five NorCal Sophomore finishes, however.)
Can she just sign up for Cat 1 at Sea Otter, or is this forbidden without an official USA Cycling upgrade? On the flip side, if she qualifies at the NorCal state championships as Varsity / Cat 1, is she forced to ride Cat 1 at Nats, does she have a choice of Cat 1 / Cat 2 at Nats, or is she forced to ride Cat 2 since she hasn't had an official USA Cycling upgrade?
(We have a question in by e-mail to Jan at USA Cycling earlier this week, but got a vacation message with no other response yet.)
Thanks for your help!
A USAC Official can upgrade a MTB rider from category 3 to category 2. It also states that "only races permitted by USA Cycling or foreign races permitted by a UCI afflilliated National federation will count for upgrading". And all category 1 upgrades require a license reissue.
Ok, I caught Jan on the phone. She's recovering from a backlog of hundreds of e-mails!
Basically...
o You don't register at a USA Cycling XC race as Cat 1 unless you're on the books as upgraded.
o If my kid's interested in an upgrade, it can be applied for at the USA Cycling site, and she'd describe her NorCal results.
o Jan believes that NorCal has *not* yet applied to have their 2011 state champs race serve as a Nationals qualifier. (I've e-mailed the NorCal folks about this.)
Also, frustratingly, the 2011 XC MTB qualifiers for our region are not yet listed anywhere, and she recognizes the problem...
-Greg