Logan Owen became weightless on wheels by leg-pressing 400 pounds.
The Bremerton High School freshman, a five-time U.S. junior cyclocross champion, is pumping and pedaling to the pinnacle of the cycling world. It’s a consuming quest, and it begins with conditioning.
“You hear about football and how that’s so hard, and all these sports that are ‘America’s pastimes.’ But this is so much harder,” Owen said, describing a workout regiment that includes between 250 and 1,000 miles of bicycle riding per week, depending on the season. “It’s not given as much respect as it should. It’s like a ton of sports put into one.”
Owen’s life on wheels launched at the age of 4, when his parents purchased a BMX bike for $79. Less than a year after gripping those handle bars and flying off his first jump, he was sponsored by Redline, a bicycle manufacturer from California.
Today he owns junior championships in BMX-biking, indoor and outdoor in-line speed skating as well as road racing to go with the five cyclocross national titles.
He’s 14 years old.
“He’s got that eye of a tiger,” said Owen’s trainer Joe Holmes, director of Seattle’s Hagens Berman Cycling Team. “He likes to compete, which you can’t teach. It has to come from within.”
As the tire tread under his seat continue to sizzle, Owen is setting some super-sized goals. His dream is to race in the Tour de France and become an Olympic athlete, joining the Kirk sisters, Nathan Adrian and Bree Schaaf in Bremerton’s family of Olympians.
In the more immediate future, he hopes to secure a national road racing championship and climb the sport’s ladder. There is more money available in road racing than in cyclocross, Owen said, so it’s a sport he believes he could turn into a career.
If the 2009 USA Cycling Jr, U-23, Elite Road National Championships in Bend, Ore., were any indication, the outlook is bright. It was Owen’s first national road racing event, and he placed third out of 59 in the men’s 13-14 race.
“I just need to keep doing what I’m doing, keep winning,” Owen said. “I’m just aiming for road (nationals) right now, trying to go win that.”
More recently, the wizard on wheels wrapped up his fifth junior cyclocross title in as many years, overcoming equipment problems, a 40-second deficit, sub-20-degree temperatures and snowy terrain to secure gold at the 2009 Junior Cyclocross National Championships in Bend last month.
The victory was particularly gratifying because Owen started on the “second line” as opposed to the “front line” — racers line up in rows prior to the gun, jockeying for position — yet he managed to win by 20 seconds.
In that race, riders completed five laps on a three-quarters-of-a-mile-long track, which required competitors to frequently dismount and lug their bikes over obstacles such as staircases and steep, icy slopes.
Most cyclocross riders bring two bikes to race because breakdowns and mechanical problems are frequent on the uneven — and unpredictable — terrain.
“You definitely want to be on the front line for cyclocross because it’s an all-out sprint,” Owen said. “You just want to be out in front the whole time. Whenever you’re behind, you’re just trying to get to that next guy, picking them off until you get to the front.”
Road racing is different than cyclocross because road racing courses don’t feature the built-in obstacles of cyclocross. The equipment used is similar. A cyclocross bike looks like a road bike, but has more clearance between the frame and wheels to account for mud build-up. Cyclocross also requires thick, knobby tires compared to the thin, streamline tires featured in road racing.
After most cyclocross races, riders are coated in muck and whatever else the track kicks up.
“The nastier the weather, the better, that’s kind of the philosophy of cyclocross,” said Logan Owen’s father, Steve. “You have a lot of off-road and very little on-road.”
In addition to his desire to win, Logan Owen competes in cyclocross and in-line speed skating — he is a member of the Federal Way-based Team Extreme — to cross-train for road racing. Cyclocross season is fall-to-winter and the “road” season is spring-to-summer.
Owen said speed-skating helps with his acceleration and agility and, since it’s an indoor sport, provides an alternative to riding in the rain. He also continues to ride BMX to increase his “explosive power,” though his competitive days in that sport may be numbered due to the travel it requires and the time he is dedicating to road racing and cyclocross.
With his sights set on a road racing career, Owen continues to juggle the rigor of the sport with his obligations as a student. He recently improved his grade-point average from 3.8 to 4.0.
Holmes believes Owen could catapult to the next level, but it’s going to boil down to dedication.
“One big issue for Logan is to remain hungry and passionate about the sport,” Holmes said. “To get to that level he’s talking about, he’s got to make a commitment.”
