One of the most fruitful ways 3D Racing owner Chris Herting can assure name recognition for his company is by sponsoring his own cycling team. Since 1992, Herting, one-man owner of the custom-built bike frame company, has built mountain bikes for his team members. The local mountain bike team, which relies entirely on sponsorship, mostly from Durango businesses, is up and coming in its field.

So far among the professional field, Herting boasts of team rider Matt Shriver’s 9th-place finish last year at a race in Snowmass. To date it is the best-placing pro-class finish in the team’s history.

Made up of professional mountains bikers, in the cross country and short track disciplines, Team 3D Racing is sporting its manager’s high-end mountain bike frames that he crafts in his studio on Florida Mesa. Herting says managing a professional team is intensely laborious, and he relies on team riders to be

the “ambassadors.” The team’s members are: Cody Peterson, Matt Shriver, Josh Bezecny, Cale Redpath and Sarah Tescher.

“The whole reason I do this is for fun,” explains Herting. “I am so keyed into the one-on-one relationships with them.”

3D is still a small-enough team – in numbers and funding – that riders get their own training coaches or work on their own. The training commitment alone, says Herting, is sometimes up to 30 hours per week during the racing season. Add to that the commitment each has to make of going to 70 percent of the races sponsored by the National Off-Road Biking Association, translating to nearly 30 races each year.

Funding from sponsors helps pay for race-entry fees, travel and lodging. Herting, of course, supplies his hand-made bikes and team kits.

– Amy Maestas