While many of us relax and enjoy a laidback weekend, sophomore Aaron Suits experiences a huge adrenaline rush, racing a bike downhill at high speeds.

Suits travels all over the state to compete in time trial races.

The downhill trials are conducted similarly to skiing, except that there is no snow and the athlete is on a bike. “There’s a gate at the top and after six beeps you have to start,” Suits said. “Whoever is the fastest wins.”

Suits describes the sport as “a lot more difficult than regular mountain biking” —downhill mountain biking is much faster, as bikers average 15 miles per hour and reach speeds as high as 35 mph on straightaways.

Suits took up the sport when he was 12 years old and got off to a strong start, winning his first race in Telluride, Colo.

He has continued to do well, but has been somewhat frustrated by the results.

“It seems that I always get fourth place,” he said. “Usually my friends beat me out. In my past five races, I have three fourths, one fifth and one 14th.”

The 14th-place finish, however, came in what Suits describes as “the biggest race in the U.S.”—Sea Otter in Monterey.

Suits practices in a race-like environment locally at trails in Auburn and competes at locations such as Northstar, Laguna Seca Raceway, Infineon Raceway, and Fontana/Los Angeles. His Sea Otter race took 3 minutes, but races average 3-4 minutes and Northstar takes as long as 11 minutes.

Suits has a semi-sponsorship with a Yeti dealership, allowing him to get discounts on merchandise.

Suits has broken his collarbone and elbow, and has suffered frequent bruises, cuts, and scrapes.

“At the beginning of last summer at Northstar, in the first race of the season, I fell coming out of the starting gate, split my elbow open, but still finished the race,” Suits said.

Most falls occur in the final practice before a race, when a bicyclist goes as fast as possible in order to find the course’s limits, Suits said. Falls during races are much rarer.

The extreme races do not stop Suits from playing sports here at SCDS—last year he played JV soccer and varsity baseball.

“Most of the races are during the summer,” he said. “A few of them are during school, but they rarely interfere with other sports.”

Suits wants to continue biking after he graduates, and said that his love for the sport will affect his college choice.

“I want to go to school somewhere where I could ride my bike in the mountains,” Suits said.

However, Suits does not believe he will devote his life to racing at the professional level.

“It’s very difficult to turn pro,” he said. “I might progress to semipro, but I probably will not turn pro.”

While Suits may stop pursuing the sport competetively in the future, he still plans to keep the sport an important part of his life. “I will probably work at a bike company,” he said.