With the way he cycles, no racer should be surprised when passed by Whitehorse’s Troy Henry.
Besides, you can hear him coming—and for most, Henry’s distinctive whoosh is the sound of doom.
“They hear the wheels before they hear me breathing,” said Henry. “That’s a bit of a team joke. Wheels that have a lot of dish to them, when you’re pedalling them on the pavement the sound resonates, kind of like a drum. So when you go past someone they go: (whooshing sounds).
“They call them the whoosh-whoosh wheels.”
Henry, 19, sounded his way to the fastest time in his first VeloNorth race Saturday, the Carcross Cut-off Time Trial, since suffering a broken wrist a month ago while training for the mountain bike portion of the Canada Summer Games.
“I hit a tree going pretty quick,” said Henry. “I hit a stump that was hidden by a patch of grass and I wasn’t expecting it. It threw the bike sideways and I was in the air and couldn’t do much about it until I hit the tree.
“I had to go down to Vancouver to have surgery on it because I messed it up pretty badly. But it’s healed enough that I can ride and I’ve been training for the last two weeks now.”
Henry began the season by winning VeloNorth’s first five events, setting new records in some along the way. He started with the first Carcross Cutoff Time Trial on May 6, completing the 17.5-kilometre course from the cutoff, south on the Alaska Highway 8.75-kilometres, and back, finishing with a time of 23 minutes and 36 seconds. On Saturday he was 10 seconds slower, but still beat second place Mike McCann by almost a minute. It was McCann’s best result of the season.
“There was a wind today, but it wasn’t that bad,” said Henry. “I like to look on the bright side of things and I’ve ridden in worse wind than this.”
Also returning to the top of the field was Whitehorse’s Heather Enders, 22, taking first in the expert women’s class with a time of 27:58. Like Henry, Enders dominated early in the season, winning the cycling club’s first four events.
“I went out pretty strong and I tried to keep a high speed and high pedal stroke throughout the entire race,” said Enders, who finished the first Carcross Cut-off trial with a time of 28:55. “I felt really strong; my heart rates were where they should be in a time trial.”
Enders missed VeloNorth’s previous race and finished third in the Skagway Hill Climb on May 24. However, recently, Enders finished seventh for women in the Tour of Fairbanks Five Stage Road Race in Alaska June 11-14.
“I’ve been having really good races lately (and) really good time trials,” said Enders. “We had a really deep women’s field (in Fairbanks) and it was really nice to be back racing against really high-level women.”
Finishing two and a half minutes behind Enders was last year’s high school mountain bike champ, Kelsey Kabanak.
Results
Men’s expert
1st Troy Henry - 23:46
2nd Mike McCann - 24:39
3rd Jerome McIntyre - 25:48
4th John Berryman - 25:59
5th Derrick Hynes - 26:10
Women’s expert
1st Heather Enders - 27:58
2nd Kelsey Kabanak - 30:28
3rd Kaitlyn MacDonald - 30:40
Sport men
1st Bob Bowerman - 27:13
2nd David Gonda - 27:38
3rd Jarrid Davy - 28:27
4th Bill Curtis - 30:20
5th Nathan Leenders - 30:28
6th Tom Ullyett - 31:02
7th Neil Ryckman - 34:03
Sport women
1st Trena Irving - 31:29
2nd Shannon Meekins - 32:06
Recreation women
1st Cassandra Kelly - 33:52
2nd Jackie Hynes - 34:36
3rd Suzan Davy - 37:27
Contact Tom Patrick
at tomp@yukon-news.com