Cooper Dendel Ott: Her Journey From XC to Enduro

Hello! I’m Cooper Ott I am a professional enduro mountain bike racer and a Podiumwear sponsored athlete. I first started racing during my second year at Northern Michigan University, and was racing XC. I spent the next 5 years or so racing my way up in the Wisconsin Off Road Series (WORS) and other races around the midwest. After graduating from college in 2015 with a degree in Elementary education, my now husband Phil and I packed our things and headed to Crested Butte, Colorado in search of adventure! Bigger races, new trails, and crazy awesome skiing were just a few of the things that drew us to Crested Butt or CB as all the local call it.

The fall/winter after we moved to CB I spent a ton of time training and worrying about upcoming XC season. The races start early out here, with my first race of the season, The Whiskey 50, at the end of April. The Whiskey 50 was a BIG one! 50 miles of dirt roads, a bit of singletrack, and a ton of suffering (7,000 ft uphill). I have never been so close to dropping out of a race before but was convinced by my friend Andrea that I was NOT a quitter and was going to finish the race. Although I finished dead last, I still finished the race. The 10 hour drive back from Prescott, AZ was a long one. I questioned if I even wanted to race XC anymore. The most important thing to me was to have fun and that race was not fun for me.

The very next weekend Phil and I went to Moab, UT for an Enduro race where I traded my XC bike for my trail bike. Okay, hold on, how sweet is it that all of these places are well within driving distance from the snowy mountains of Crested Butte?!!? I had raced a few enduro races in the Midwest but this one felt different. Unlike the low key midwest races I didn’t know any of the other ladies racing, besides Katie Compton the cyclocross legend, or the trails. Phil and I went out and pre-rode all of the stages on Friday before the race and had a blast! The next day we raced and it was SO. MUCH. FUN! I had multiple crashes, and had to run up a hill, but I knew as soon as I crossed the finish line of the final stage that this was discipline that I wanted to race.

The next question was how to do it. I had already told my sponsors that I would be racing a full XC season. Luckily, I had awesome sponsors like Podiumwear and Honey Stinger that I was able to make it happen. Podiumwear was able to switch up my kits to have more freeride jerseys, since I would no longer be needing multiple XC kits. Next, I signed up for the Big Mountain Enduro series, and Enduro World Series race in Aspen. My season had just taken a serious course re-route and I couldn’t have been happier.

Over the course of the season I learned so much about enduro racing. This was no walk in the park! There were features that I was terrified of, crashes, and pure exhaustion. Along with the challenges there were also high speed flowy descents, meeting new people, and pushing myself to new limits. I had a fantastic first season on the enduro circuit, I even placed top 10 and was the fastest American in the Aspen Enduro World Series race. The enduro circuit had stolen my heart, and some of my blood.

Stay tuned for a 2017 season recap!