Teams first rendezvous, and presentation to the Snow Valley Club

9:00AM Fitness Concepts Fairfax, VA
In a cramped weight room in the Fitness Concepts complex the team gathered to establish a common starting point for the 2005 season. First introductions. As members introduced themselves gaps were filled in my database about my fiercest competitors. I am very excited to be on a team that consists of most of my local rivalries, it can only mean that we will help each other improve instead of battling amongst each other to be the best rider from our region at the national events.
The second topic of the day was; what is Seal-ON? Of course every one already knows about the team original sponsor Snow Valley; a bottled water company that serves the Washington D.C. Baltimore area. Not many know what about the team’s newest sponsor Seal-On. Team Director Jamie Davis quickly broke Seal-On’s image down for the team. Seal-On is a product line of stop bleeding medical products to be sold over the counter. Seal-On is a company based out of Dublin Ireland and they are very excited about using a cycling team to help introduce their product to the United States Market.

10:30AM Get the Ride on
Heading out the W.O.&D. Bike path on an icy cold day. It was catching up time with the new team members. Normally I only get a few chances a year to catch up with some of these guys. I spent most of the ride talking to Josh Taylor and catching up to the details of what each other had been up to since the days when Josh’s training partner Jeff Rutter what my coach and we used to bang out some tough training rides together. In between our small talk I shouted out some directions since I grew up in Chantilly, VA I knew a way to get off the W.O.&D. bike trail and enjoy some of the steep hills that pepper the northern Virginia area. It was great to be out on the bike with a few members of the new team. Unfortunate the enjoyable out door riding had to come to an end as we headed back to test our VO2 and do some team bonding on a challenge course that team Manager/Captain Jon Wirsing put together the previous day.

7:00 PM Ellicott City MD Club Party
The Snow Valley Club party was located in a pub in the cozy town of Ellicott City MD. At the club party the new Pro team would be presented. It was inspirational event; sharing the beginning of the pro team with a club who has been strongly representing the Snow Valley name. Club president and pro team director Arch Mckown revealed that the Pro team was a dream that had been developing over the past couple seasons. To launch the pro team Jon Wirsing introduced each pro team rider and each rider would present one of the team’s sponsors. This introduced the club to both the Pro riders and the team’s sponsors. The best introduction and presentation was Kyle Wamsley who presented team sunglasses sponsor Rudy Project and used them to look in to the team’s bright future. The night ran long and the Pub staff had to ask for the event to end so their regular customers could get to their normal socializing.