The Tour de Haines Junction had every kind of weather  you can imagine; there was rain, wind, snow, sunshine, headwinds and tailwinds.

Saturday was the time trial, which started off wet and cold and became dryer and warmer to the finish.

In the afternoon, U Kon Echelon put on a new race, a hill climb leaving from Bear Creek Lodge up the hill toward Beaver Creek.

The hill climb was 10 km, and although a little more gradual than the hill climb on the other side, leg one of KCIBR, still challenging and vertically challenging.

The weather warmed up for the hill climb and the sun shone. The group finished off their day at Frosty Freeze for pizza, icecream and the best part: team bonding. 

Sunday was challenging! It was cold, wet, windy and snowing!

We shortened the race to be 50 km, which was plenty, given the cold conditions.

Again, it started off super-wet and cold, and then grew dryer as the race went on. 

Stand-out performances in each race; James McCann is strong, fast and dominant this year.

He took first place in u17 boys (at 14 years old) and did break away  giving him the top youth times in all races.

Alex Lebarge also took the fastest times in his category, pushing and striving to beat his personal records and finishing the road race in a break away with Doon McDowell.

Doon is a new rider to Echelon but he is riding hard and learning lots from assistant coach Ava Staley.

Ava is trying out for spots on both the mountain bike team and road bike teams next summer for the Canada Games and she is working with athletes to help develop the team. Veronica Porter is fast, strong, and able to hold the pace with the fast group. 

The race saw only two adults riding amongst the youth; David Jackson, 25 years old,   rides for Capital City Cycling out of Victoria, and participated in every race and rode the fastest times of each race. Shea Hoffman raced on Saturday only.

Otherwise, the entire weekend saw an age spread of nine years old to 14 for boys, and 16 and 17 for the females.

Trena Irving and Naoko Buurman rode as support for riders. 

Next summer we are all hoping that Canada Games 2022 will happen in Niagara Falls, Ont., as they are scheduled to.

With these young, strong riders out riding their legs off, be it wind, rain, snow or sunshine, things are looking good for Team Yukon next summer.

Eligible ages for the road cycling team for CSG include 16 years old to 21 years old as of next year.  For any youth interested in road cycling or riding to try out for Canada Games, please get hold of Trena at  trenairving@gmail.com  or see  http://yukoncycling.com  for more info. 

Next up is the Tour de Skagway, which will take place on the Canadian side only, in Fraser, B.C., on May 22/23. 

This story was submitted by the U Kon Echelon Bike Club.