Cutters’ Depasse follows top ITT finish with victory at Saturday’s Miss-N-Out

As soon as Kevin Depasse crossed the finish line at Saturday’s Miss-N-Out at Bill Armstrong Stadium, he couldn’t wait to steal a glance at who rode behind him.

The Cutters senior knew there was a sizable gap between him and the second-place rider after he jumped in front with a burst of speed around turn two, but he didn’t know where his teammate Tim Nixon sat in relation to the other final rider, Sigma Nu’s Brice Brookshire.

When Depasse crossed, he turned to peek behind him, and he saw Nixon right there.
Then he let out a roar of joy.

“(I yelled) just because of where Tim was,” Depasse said. “I didn’t yell until I looked back and saw Tim was in second, because I didn’t know where he was. That’s why I yelled. Again, it’s one-two. It’s pretty awesome.”

The Cutters senior duo finished one-two in the event, just as they had at Wednesday’s Individual Time Trials.

Depasse’s win was not only his best finish but his first time ever making it to the finals of Miss-N-Out. He slid out in turn four of the quarterfinals last year. Two years ago he advanced to the semifinals before being eliminated.

This year he stood easily in sole possession of first place by the end of the day.
The final heat included Beta Theta Pi’s Eric Anderson and Will Kragie, and Sigma Chi’s Brian Arfmann in addition to Depasse, Nixon and Brookshire.

Arfmann was the first eliminated. Brookshire knew he had to make a move to try to get in between the other two teams.

“I didn’t have the best starting position because of my seed, so I had to make a huge move on the outside to get a better position,” Brookshire said. “That really took it out of me. That got me into third place.”

Brookshire managed to ride up alongside Depasse, pushing the Betas to the far outside.

“Our strategy kind of fell apart when it came down to those last two laps,” Kragie said. “We were both pretty gassed from taking some questionable outside lines.”

Kragie and Anderson both looked at each other to try to figure out who should go on to try to contend with the other three in the final laps.

But taking that time effectively eliminated them both.

“When it came down to choosing which one of us was going to move on, we both kind of sat back, and by the time we realized what was happening, they were gone,” Kragie said.

Kragie eventually took himself out, but Anderson could not reach the pack before the lap was over.

“I respect the hell out of those guys,” Depasse said. “Kragie and Anderson are both very good riders in their own right. ”

In the final lap, Nixon  said he knew Brookshire wouldn’t have enough left to carry it out.

“I was taking deep breaths behind him waiting for about turn two when I knew I could come around him,” he said.

Nixon eventually made the pass around Brookshire and turned his sights on his teammate, who had already created a large gap.

“I knew what I needed to do to win,” Depasse said. “And I knew Brice was tired. So if I attacked him, Tim was more likely to beat him because he was going to try to hold my wheel. By removing myself from that situation, it’s easier for Tim to beat him.”

Nixon pursued and thought he might have a shot when Depasse hit the wind, but that window quickly closed.

“He kind of tucked down and just pushed through it,” Nixon said of Depasse. “When he slowed down, I thought I might be able to get him, and I really tried to turn it on and go after him to at least make it close at the line.”

Despite two top finishes for Depasse and Nixon, they refuse to change their confidence level. They’re both focused on a bigger picture.

“Those are just stepping stones,” Depasse said of the Springs Series events. “We want to win the race. This stuff is a test of fitness and a test of form to see where we are.

“But it doesn’t mean anything really if we don’t win the race.”