Sean Fincham: U23 National Champ on Squamish and surviving mid-race mechanicals

At just 19 years old, Sean Fincham is only in his second year of racing the highly competitive U23 category. The defending Canadian national champion isn’t planning on waiting around for his chance to move up the international ranks, though. The Squamish rider is pushing hard at the front of a wave of talented young Canadians taking on the World Cup circuit this season, following in the tire tracks of Canada’s top elite riders.

Coming home from his first European campaign of the season with the Cycling Canada’s national mountain bike team, Forward Racing-Norco’s young racer has made impressive progress up through the U23 ranks. Fincham finished all the way up in 17th at the Nove Mesto na Morave World Cup in the Czech Republic. Just a week earlier, he matched his previous best World Cup finish, set at Mont-Saint-Anne World Cup in 2017, by working his way from 41st on the start grid to 21st place by the end of a chaotic, muddy race in Albstadt, Germany.

Over coffee, I talked to Fincham about racing SORCA Toonie races in the land of steeps and slab lines, racing USAC Collegiate National’s, Cairns world championships and some sketchy moment’s on the way to winning his first U23 Canadian national title in Canmore, Alta. last summer.

Sean Fincham grew up 45 minutes north of Vancouver in Squamish, B.C., a small town originally built around the forestry industry that has built an international reputation as a riding destination. “Cycling is really big in the community,” Fincham says of his hometowns influence on his riding, “everybody has a bike.”

It was an ideal environment for learning how to race at a young age, including the Wednesday night SORCA Toonie races, put on by Squamish’s trail organization. “The Toonies are really big, and a lot of fun,” says Fincham. The races draw huge crowds of locals for a night of low-key, but high-paced racing. “Especially when I was younger, it’d be a really good field, and I was 15 years old racing against these fully grown men,” Fincham says. “It was really competitive, which I think was helpful because it would push me.”

RELATED: Fincham finishes 17th: World Cup U23 results from Nové Město na Moravě

There was also Team Squamish, a cross country oriented team focused on young riders to XC racing that Fincham now helps coach, when he has the time. “There’s a bunch of younger people that have joined in the last year, and we’re trying to introduce them to the racing side of the sport,” says Fincham, who admits young riders are also drawn away from XC by the growth of trail and enduro racing. Along with several Enduro World Series pro’s Squamish is home to Miranda Miller, the current downhill world champion.

Fincham and fellow young Squamish rider Holden Jones, who won bronze in the Junior Men’s XCO at last year’s world championships in Cairns, Australia, are showing that, while the town may be known for it’s steeper, gravity-oriented riding, there’s also a path to XC racing. “I think people, and younger kids especially, are seeing now what myself and Holden are doing, and they’re influenced by it,” he says. “We have people being successful on the international scene, which inspires younger people to take up cross country racing, instead of enduro or downhill.”

As for his own race at Cairns, Fincham is candid that he wanted more from his first crack at the U23 race. Lacking UCI points put Fincham at the back of the field. “The course made it challenging to move up through the field” he says of the exceptionally dusty Cairns track, “but I think I pushed pretty hard to get to 33rd place.” “It’s not the result I was hoping for,” Fincham says, looking back at the race, “but I do have to take in account that it was my first year, so I’ve got a few years left to improve on that.”

From Cairns, Fincham jumped right back into the US college racing scene. The US college league includes road, cross and, in the fall, mountain biking and Fincham races all three for Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) in Altlanta, Georgia. US racing means more time on the bike through the winter, instead of on a trainer in Canada, and a chance to see and ride new places. “It’s fun to travel around the country for those races,” Fincham says of the US circuit, “and a few people I race with in the regular season, I get to see them through collegiate racing.”

He’s one of just a few Canadians who’ve made the move south for his studies. Also at SCAD is Nova Scotia’s Mackenzie Myatt, who won the USAC College mountain bike and road national titles this past school year. Fincham’s race didn’t quite go as planned, flatting at the top of a 30 minute climb while riding in the lead trio.

“Collegiate is a little loose with the rules, they’re not quite UCI courses,” said Fincham.”The course was just straight up then straight back down, so I rolled down the whole descent with a flat then swapped it out myself in the pits.” The race was gone up the road by that point, but Fincham worked his way back to finish eighth.

Earlier that year, Fincham’s U23 race at Canadian national cross country championships looked to be going the same way. “That race was … nerve wracking. And stressful,” Fincham says of his race in Canmore. “It ended up very rewarding, but there was a moment where my rotor came loose, then came off.”

With his rear disc brake rotor rattling around between the spokes and the frame, it was a race to get back to the pits without getting passed, or crashing on the loose, dusty Canmore course. “I did half a lap with just a front brake, which was pretty scary down some of the chutes, but I didn’t want to take the B-lines because they were so much slower.” All the while, Raphael Auclair (Pivot-OTE) was closing in behind. “It was pretty stressful,” Fincham says, “I knew second place was pretty close.”

Fincham recovered from the mechanical to win the U23 national title, which he’s looking forward to defending this year when the race returns to Canmore. It’s a course that the Forward Racing rider, says suits him. “There’s a good length of climbing, in that couple minutes range,” he says and “there’s some steep gnarly chutes on the downhills. Being from Squamish, that’s pretty relatable for me.”

In addition to defending his Canadian title, Fincham’s focus is squarely on the World Cup season. That meant leaving Georgia early, and switching to taking online courses, so that he could race the early season Bear Mountain Canada Cup and California ProXCT races. The early season races are a crucial opportunity to earn UCI points before heading overseas. Having more local UCI races in Canada is important, Fincham says, especially for U23 riders, who have to race in the massive Elite field at the HC races in California.

In a hint of what was to come in Europe, Fincham placed well in each of those early races this year. In Victoria, he finished fourth, behind his Forward Racing teammate Andrew L’Esperance, who won the race. Fincham was then 14th at Bonelli Park and 17th at Fontana City before placing all the way up in 7th at the Sea Otter Classic XC. Sea Otter was won by Anton Cooper (Trek Factory Racing) who would later place second in a dramatic spring finish with Nino Schurter (Scott-SRAM) at the Nové Mesto World Cup.

The Forward Racing duo will try race the two Ontario Canada Cup rounds between trips overseas. They’ll also be sure to be in top form when the series lands in Novia Scotia, L’Esperance’s home province and where many of the Forward Racing’s supporters are based.

As for racing at home in Squamish, Fincham says, “Unfortunately, it’s not looking like I’ll be able to.” With the busy international racing schedule, the young rider will barely have the chance to make it back to Squamish. “But maybe,” Fincham says, “I’ll be at home to pop into a Toonie race sometime.”