The closest thing to flying’

Peter Welte remembers trying to shake off the sleepiness as he rolled out of bed almost every morning, quickly changing his clothes and darting to school atop the seat of his bike. This was his first foray into competitive cycling, as Welte’s goal was beating the school bus that he routinely missed to school.

That was when Welte went to high school in Beaverton. Now the 25-year-old attends Portland State, and instead of pedaling feverishly beside a long yellow bus, he is jockeying for position on the course with his peers as a member of the PSU Cycling club.

The PSU Cycling club is comprised of about 40 cycling aficionados like Welte, though just over 20 riders race in weekend events. Much of the club’s focus is on road competitions, as it competes in the Northwest Collegiate Cycling Conference. However, it also accepts cyclists that are interested in track, cyclocross and mountain racing.

As a member of the Northwest Collegiate Cycling Conference, the PSU Cycling club travels across the western United States to compete in events. Thus far, the team has traveled in large passenger vans to Corvallis and Eugene, Ore., as well as Bellingham and Seattle, Wash., for competitions, a definite team-building exercise.

“Everyone gets pretty close when you’re sitting in a van for however long, like in two weeks we’re going to Montana, which is going to be a 14-hour van ride,” said James Ceccorulli, a first-year member.

This past weekend, the team left the vans parked because the NWCCC event was held in Portland for the first time this season. PSU Cycling hosted the two-day event, with Saturday’s competition at Hagg Lake, about 40 miles outside the Rose City, and Sunday’s at Mt. Tabor Park in Southeast Portland.

PSU Cycling finished sixth and eighth, respectively, in the road race, and time trials at Hagg Lake Saturday, with Western Washington nabbing first place in both events.

Amid the tree cover offered at Mt. Tabor Park, the Portland State team squared off against fellow NWCCC squads, like Western Washington, Oregon State, Oregon, Montana State and Whitman College, among others, in the criterium on a soggy Sunday.

A criterium is a circuit race that is less than a mile long. However, since the course at Mt. Tabor Park is 1.3 miles, Sunday’s event was considered a circuit road race, even though it was still referred to as a criterium. Portland State performed well on the steep slope-laden course, coming away with 266 points, good enough for second place in the event.

“This is a pretty awesome course,” Welte said of one at Mt. Tabor Park. “It’s basically uphill and then downhill without a lot of flat sections, so it really favors climbers.”

Several individual performances headlined Portland State’s weekend. Ceccorulli placed third, while Tyler Green came across the finish line sixth in Men’s B, Josh Egan finished second in Men’s C and Jake Hanson took second in Men’s D. On the women’s side, Anita Dillies earned the most overall points in the race but finished just behind Western Washington’s Meagan McPhee in Women’s A.

“It was more difficult than most criteriums because of the typography,” Dillies said of Mt. Tabor Park’s numerous hills. “Just the constant climbing makes it difficult.”

Dillies, in her first year on the Portland State team despite having raced since 2005, currently tops the women’s NWCCC standings with a 60-point lead over Kendi Thomas of Whitman College.

As long as Dillies performs relatively well in the remaining races this season, she is guaranteed her first trip to the USA Cycling Collegiate Road National Championships in Fort Collins, Colo., from May 9 to 11. About 500 of the top collegiate cyclists will compete for national titles in 18 categories at the event.

“I’m pretty excited about it,” Dillies said about the prospect of contending for a national road-racing title. “I’ve been having a really good time. It’s lots of fun.”

While PSU Cycling is enjoying success this season, currently fifth in the NWCCC team standings, the club hopes to make many advancements over the next year.

Expansion is at the top of the list for improvements, as PSU Cycling looks to attract more members and extend their participation to other forms of racing such as track, cyclocross and mountain racing, Dillies said. Other enhancements include securing a team tent and trainers, which are stationary bikes riders use to warm up, before next year, Welte said.

One change that is not on the docket is the level of enjoyment and fun members of the club have had biking.

“I just feel like when I am on the bike it is the closest thing I have to flying,” Welte said. “As painful as it is, it’s just enjoyable to crest that hill and know you’ve gone that distance.”