‘Cross Classics: Hyde and Powers Duel for Their Legacies at 2018 Reno Nats
Powers the mentor, Hyde the protege, on the line was much much more than a Stars-and-Stripes jersey
In a normal year, we would all be convening in suburban Chicago for the 2020 Cyclocross Nationals family reunion. This, of course, is not a normal year, and for good reason, our family reunion will have to wait.
Instead of lamenting the loss of what would have been the end of the 2020 domestic season, I thought it would be a great time to look back on one of the all-time great American cyclocross races—the 2018 Reno Nationals Elite Men’s race.
Good races are good races, but athletic contests achieve greatness when there is more than just a win or loss or even a jersey on the line. The Reno Nats Elite Men’s race had more on the line and then some. We take a look back at the before, during, and after in this first edition of ‘Cross Classics.
The Year of Tobin
The story of the 2018 Reno Men’s Nationals had three main players—the young gun Tobin Ortenblad, the new King of ‘Cross Stephen Hyde, and one of the all-time American greats looking for a career-capping win in Jeremy Powers.
Although Hyde had taken the crown of U.S. King of ‘Cross from Powers during the 2016-17 season, capping it with a win at Hartford Nationals, the story of that domestic season was Tobin Ortenblad. Racing in his second year as an Elite with his Santa Cruz / Donkey Label Racing privateer program, Ortenblad rocked the one-year US Cup-CX series from the outset winning both days at the KMC Cross Fest and the first day of Charm City. He then stayed out east and casually swept the Gloucester weekend (RIP) before heading back to the US Cup-CX series with a commanding lead.
Two bad days and a resurgence from Hyde cost Ortenblad the series overall, but he bounced back to take second at Pan-Ams in Louisville to head into the second half of the domestic season on a high note. Ortenblad then won six straight races at CXLA, Resolution, and Ruts ‘n Guts to head into Nationals on a six-race winning streak.
Ortenblad headed to Reno looking to put an emphatic exclamation mark on an incredible season and show that he was ready to make that giant Elite national champion step.
2017 was supposed to be the Year of Hyde in domestic cyclocross, but early season illness threw Hyde off his form, which helped open the door for a breakout season from a rider such as Ortenblad. When Hyde returned to form, he caught fire, winning Day 2 of Charm City and then sweeping both the Cincy and Derby City weekends, including a rather dominant win at Pan-Ams. Hyde then went on to race in Europe, where he finished 11th at Namur and 13th at Zolder, suggesting a return to the Euro top 10 for U.S. Elite Men’s cyclocross was near.
Hyde said it over and over during the 2017 season—no one wants to be a one-hit-wonder. Hyde craved that second national championship to show his 2017 win at Hartford was not a fluke and his cyclocross show had staying power on the U.S. scene.
If I am being honest, I feel like sometimes we U.S. cyclocross fans forget how utterly dominant Jeremy Powers was in 2014 and 2015. During those two seasons, Powers lost exactly 2 domestic races—both days of the Derby City Cup in 2015, to Hyde. Powers started strong at Rochester in 2016, but a pre-ride crash at the Trek CX Cup the following weekend caused an injury that would nag him for the rest of that season.
Then 34, 2017 proved just as unkind to the four-time U.S. champ, as he struggled to get consistent results and took a large number of DNFs. The scariest of these was when he pulled out of the Pan-Am Champs in Louisville with a heart issue while in serious podium contention.
To prepare for Nationals, Powers went on a bit of a vision quest—ok, so maybe that’s a little hyperbolic—and headed to the New Mexico desert to train in the month before Reno Nationals. Adjusting to the altitude and getting in a good block of training, Powers looked to put everything behind him and bring it to Reno on that one day in mid-January. On the line was a record-tying fifth Elite Men’s national championship and probably more importantly, proving to himself he still had one last elite-level effort in the tank.
It goes without saying that only one of the three men could win the race.
The Race
The 2018 Reno Cyclocross Nationals were a bit of a change from the Nationals norm. After a blizzard at Hartford and mud at Asheville, the Reno course at Rancho San Rafael Park was bone dry and the race-day temperature was in the 50s. The venue had some elevation, with Reno sitting at 4,500’ feet above sea level, and although the course had a “boring” “grass crit” appearance at first, the first half of the course was deceptively uphill and the back half had some tricky, rocky off-cambers and descents.
As journalists, we always liked to ask race winners, “Did you have a plan?” or “That attack, was that your plan?” The reality is everyone might go into a race with a plan, but 9 times out of 10, the bike racing gods are like, “Lulz, cool story, bro,” and athletes have to react more than strategerize.
Reno Nationals was an exception to that rule. After his month-long New Mexico vision quest, Powers made it clear that his plan was to put himself on the front of the race and diesel his way through the course until he cracked the will of his competitors.
Well, first Ortenblad made his presence known, hopping the Chris Blevins stairs a minute into the race, but by the midway point of that first lap, Powers was on the front.
One lap in, the Powers Train had five fare-paying riders—Hyde, Ortenblad, Curtis White, Kerry Werner, and Jack Kisseberth.
The first to go was Curtis White, whose first Elite Nationals ended with a disappointing flat tire on the hill on the far side of the course in the third lap. Then inside four to go, Kisseberth also flatted on that same hill. At the end of the lap, coming off the hill, Werner fell off the pace. At the front, the Powers Train dieseled into the last three laps with the three men at the center of our story at the front—JPow, Hyde, Tobin.
The beginning of the Reno Nats lap featured a long, slightly uphill drag past the pits to the Blevins stairs. Throughout the week, groups had exploded on this section of the course, as it was a spot where sheer power rose to the fore.
After dieseling for over half an hour at the front, Powers shifted into a new gear and attacked up the long false flat. Behind him, Tobin cracked and faded off Powers’ wheel. In an instant, his dream race appeared to be over.
Behind Ortenblad when Powers made his burst, Hyde had to punch it to move into second and stay with the blistering move.
Anyone who has seen Stephen Hyde race cyclocross knows exactly what happened next. Not content to just hold Powers’ wheel, Hyde went past him and attacked right before the stairs. For a hot second, it looked like Hyde was just biding his time before making his own race-winning move after calmly sitting in his former mentor’s draft for half the race.
Powers, however, was not going to be denied, not yet, and he regained Hyde’s wheel to make it a two-man battle inside three to go. Hyde, who got started in the sport with Powers’ JAM Fund program, was now racing his friend and mentor with so so much on the line for both men. For those of us at the venue that day, it was clear in real-time something special was happening.
At the bell, the two champs rolled down the long start-finish straight together. Powers in the vintage multi-colored Rapha kit his Aspire Racing program wore that season and Hyde in the iconic lime green of the Cannondale p/b CyclocrossWorld program he then called home.
The Reno course featured a major pinch point at the bridge crossing to the run-up and hilly off-camber at the far side of the course. Following the descent off the hill, riders wound their way through the dinosaur park largely on pavement. With few places to pass, although it was well away from the finish, the finish before the finish was hitting that bridge crossing first.
Leading up to the bridge was a flowy set of chicanes through a field. It was there Powers and Hyde treated cyclocross fans to a moment that was everything we love about the sport.
Powers led into the field and upped the pace, knowing it would make it that much more difficult for Hyde to pass him. Coming out of an early corner, Powers accelerated out of the saddle, but Hyde met his pace. Then Hyde upped his speed and Powers countered. Coming out of some tight turns, Hyde exploded to the left, Powers to the right. Side-by-side the two raced for what was a slight left-hand corner before a hard right.
Hyde got there first.
And the rest was U.S. cyclocross history.
Hyde widened his gap on the run-up and held it to the end, throwing up two fingers for his second National Championship. He was, indeed, not just a one-hit-wonder.
The Aftermath
As a journalist, I absolutely loved everything about this race. The storylines, the drama, really likable competitors, it had everything we could hope for. I flew out of Reno on Tuesday that year, and I remember kind of making plans to meet up with Bill for a post-Nats drink. Instead, I sat in my hotel room and wrote, IDK, 3,000 words about Powers and Hyde and what that race meant. I think it still stands up as a contemporary take on what we had all just witnessed.
A day later, I was listening to Dave Mable’s post-race interview with Powers, and the four-time U.S. champ said something to the effect of, “This might be my last Nationals.” Record scratch, stop the music, whuuuuut?
We soon learned that Reno Nats marked the end of Powers’ Aspire Racing program that also provided a home for young stars Ellen Noble and Spencer Petrov. At the time, Powers didn’t know if he would have sponsors for the 2018 domestic season. He would go on to get support from Fuji/Pactimo/SRAM and even finish fifth at Louisville Nationals, but that hour in Reno would be his last great offering to a sport he had done so much for.
Hyde would go on to finish 15th at Valkenburg Worlds, again showing that although he came to the sport late, he still had promise as a U.S. Men’s cyclocross racer who could compete on the international stage.
Then, just like what happened to Powers in 2016, the Trek CX Cup in Waterloo proved to be a bit of a Waterloo for the two-time national champ. After winning both days at Rochester, an unnamed, initialed Dutch rider caused Hyde to crash at the Friday C2 at Trek. The injury kept him out for a month. He returned, and then slipped and crashed into the stone stairs at Pan-Ams in Midland, Ontario not a week later.
Like Powers the year before, Hyde put everything into being ready for Louisville Nationals, and he gutted out a third-straight National Championship after an impressive duel against teammate Curtis White. With all the adversity he faced that season, the win was perhaps his finest performance yet, as he had to dig deep mentally and physically to be on form and then defeat an incredibly hungry White.
After that breakout season, Ortenblad has struggled to regain the form and promise he displayed during that magical cyclocross season. Ortenblad did not have a bad 2018-19 domestic season, but he was no longer a Topper and more of a Sub-Topper or even Middler. In fact, after finishing third on Day 1 of Rochester, he would not finish on another podium in 2018. The same story played out in 2019, where two wins at Noho highlighted an otherwise disappointing season for the Californian.
In a way, that special day in Reno shows the fickle nature of athletics and cyclocross in particular. Powers, the former champ, made one last epic stand; Hyde was the champ at the peak of his game; and Ortenblad, although he did not win, had seemingly laid the groundwork to perhaps one day take the reins of U.S. ‘cross from Hyde. Of the three, Powers has probably had the smoothest road, and he is the one who hung up his ‘cross bike for good at the end of 2018.
The last three years have shown us nothing in sport is certain, but man, for one afternoon, during one showdown in the Nevada desert, those three athletes put on one show to remember.
You can watch the full replay from USA Cycling here:
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