Online Exclusive: Aaron Gwin Is Turning heads
Colin Meagher |
Lost behind the spotlight of Olympic glory is the fact that American downhill racing of late has been undergoing a bit of resurgence in World Cup racing. Cole Bangert. Luke Strobel. JD Swanguen. Duncan Riffle. These are just a few stalwarts of America's downhill racing revival.
Add Aaron Holmes Gwin--Gwinny for short--to that list.
If you've been living in a cave, you're probably asking yourself, "Who?" If you've been reading too many of the on-line gravity fed forums, you'd think he's here to save American Downhill racing. Oh, and he walks on water and leaps tall buildings in a single bound, too.
In short, there's been a lot of overblown armchair racer smack coupled to too few facts. Here's the real skinny:
• His first race was in September of 2007 at Fontana. He took third place--in the Pro division. On Cody Warren's clapped out old DH rig.
• After racing the winter series in Fontana--which started in January--he signed with Yeti's So Cal regional development squad.
• With Yeti's support behind him, he's taken off: tenth at Sea Otter, two wins in the Mountain States series, and tenth at Mt St Anne (his first world cup race). Not exactly cream puff talent at those events, and both Snowmass and St Anne are legit tracks.
Impressive results for sure, and at twenty years old, Gwinny's flat out "moto" style of riding, tempered with a dash of BMX flow, is a thing of beauty to see on the track. But given his natural talent and his history of BMX and MX racing, these results aren't entirely miraculous; but rather the product of both a healthy racing back ground (Aaron raced BMX from age 7-12, and two stroke from 12 to 17) and focused desire.
Throttle to DH pedals was the result of a chance meeting of a friend of a friend--Cody Warren, a guy known to spend a lot of time roosting two strokes to compliment his own twenty-six inch aspirations. The two hit it off, and at some point, Aaron--who had always kept playing on a BMX bike--gave DH riding a spin. He liked it, did it a time or six with Cody, and then entered that first race at Fontana.
"I was kind of clueless as to what category to enter, so I asked Cody, and he just said 'Pro', so that's what I did."
Third in his first race could be chalked up as a fluke. And many thought exactly that. But for Gwinny, it was a test for his desire to race downhill at the highest level.
"I just wanted to see what it was like. Riding downhill was fun, but I wasn't sure about racing it yet. So that race was kind of a test. It was the winter series (in Fontana) when I started really considering the possibilities"
Colin Meagher |
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