The first ever na­tion­al moun­tain bike team de­part­ed Trinidad yes­ter­day to com­pete in the Caribbean Moun­tain Bike Cham­pi­onship in Puer­to Ri­co, on Sun­day.

The T&T team com­pris­es Ja­son Costel­loe (elite men), Ryan Chin (elite men), Can­dace Chin Fatt (elite women), Pe­ter Sel­l­i­er (ju­nior men), man­ag­er Bri­an Sel­l­i­er (Pe­ter's fa­ther) and coach Drew Ed­sall.

Be­ing T&T's first ever na­tion­al moun­tain bike (MTB) team, it bodes well for the de­vel­op­ment of the MTB dis­ci­pline un­der the T&T Cy­cling Fed­er­a­tion (TTCF) um­brel­la. The Caribbean Moun­tain Bike Cham­pi­onship will have teams from An­tigua and Bar­bu­da, Aru­ba, Ba­hamas, Cu­ra­cao, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic, Guade­loupe, Haiti, Ja­maica, Puer­to Ri­co, US Vir­gin Is­lands and T&T. The event type is known as 'XCO' (Cross Coun­try Olympic) and the course will be four-six km with mul­ti­ple laps. The elite race will take ap­prox­i­mate­ly one hour 45 min­utes and the ju­niors will be one hour 30 min­utes. The team's first pri­or­i­ty will be to re-as­sem­ble and check their bikes, then learn the course over the next cou­ple of days.

The coach will ride with the team dur­ing the train­ing and prepa­ra­tion time and will work with them to as­sess the best lines and ap­proach­es to any ob­sta­cles, as well as con­duct­ing some start drills. Ed­sall will en­sure that each ath­lete is phys­i­cal­ly and men­tal­ly pre­pared to achieve their per­son­al best for T&T.

The team is grate­ful for the fi­nan­cial as­sis­tance pro­vid­ed by the Sport Com­pa­ny of T&T. The team al­so thanked the TTCF for mak­ing this team pos­si­ble and all those who have con­tributed to the in­di­vid­u­als de­vel­op­ment and suc­cess through their sup­port, en­cour­age­ment and as­sis­tance.