Saturday night I left the alarm clock set for 4:45 a.m. Once again I picked up Rich and Mignon and we made the drive up to St. Francisville for the final stage of the West Feliciana Classic stage race. The Sunday races were run on the same course as Saturday's races, but in the opposite direction and, at least for the master's race, with an additional lap of the 20-mile loop. The sky was a bit overcast for the start and the temperature was relatively cool for much of the day's races. The 58 mile Master 35+ race started out quite calmly. The Midsouth team had five riders in the 14-rider field, three of whom had the top three slots on GC. Keith and I figured we were in for a hard ride. The MSM guys, and apparently most of the rest of the field, were focused on the hot spot near the end of the first lap, and as a result the pace was pretty slack until we started to get close to it. I was only a few seconds out of 3rd place on GC, and since it seemed unlikely that I could get a breakaway together that didn't include half of the MSM team, I figured my only hope was to nab hot spot and finish bonuses.
As we got close to the hot spot (I was not at all sure exactly where it was), Keith positioned himself at the front of the group and, with me glued to his wheel, towed the whole bunch for miles. The hot spot was at the top of one of the more significant little climbs on the loop and unfortunately I waited a moment too long to go. A few of the MSM guys flew past on the left and opened a big gap. I got past one of them on the climb, but the other two were a bit too far away and since only the top two spots counted for bonuses, I missed out on that.
The second lap started out with VJ towing the whole group for what must have been seven or eight miles. Everyone, including myself, seemed quite content to sit in the draft. As we got halfway around the loop there were a few good attacks. When we hit the hot spot hill on that lap there was a strong attack and I somehow found myself stuck behind a few riders who were stuck in molasses. In order to avoid crossing the centerline, I had to wait for what seemed like forever before I could get around them, and then had to make a super hard uphill effort to make the bridge up to the break of five or so. That break started working together right away, and I really thought we had a good chance of staying away, but a mile or two later we were chased down. After that I think most people resigned themselves to a sprint finish.
My legs were feeling OK and I definitely wanted a good placing in the finish. I hadn't really done the math, but I didn't really think there was much of a chance that I could move up in the GC based on a top three finish. Nonetheless, it was a bike race and there was a finish line and although it was a bit more of a drag race type finish than I like, I was definitely going to give it a shot. The MSM guys did a stellar job over the last six or seven miles. There was one attack after another, forcing Keith and me and a few others to do a lot of work and discouraging other attacks while their top two guys stayed in the relative comfort of the draft. I have to admit, there's something I like about the challenge of being outnumbered like that, but in this case it turned out to be pretty effective. Once again, Keith came to the front to give me some protection and help over those final few miles, at one point towing the whole group for quite a long time.
As usual, the sprint started a bit early (for me). With 200 meters to go I was sitting comfortably on Jay's wheel. He was definitely moving forward on the left, passing riders who were starting to fade, and for a moment I thought I had a good shot. Then he suddenly stopped accelerating, catching me by surprise. I hesitated for moment, trying to decide which way to go and losing a bit of my momentum. I ended up coming in 4th, once again one place short of a bonus, not that it would have mattered much.
In the other races, Mignon finished an impressive 4th in the women's road race and 3rd on GC, while Stephen Mire came in 2nd in his road race. Unfortunately, Stephen's TT had been pretty far down on the lis, otherwise he would have easily been in the top five. In the Cat. 1/2/3 race, Matt Davis and Frank Moak got away on the hot spot hill (aka Red Bug Hill) and finished about two minutes up on the pack. When the pack sprint came by I was happy to see Brandon right there in the mix, taking 2nd in the pack sprint. In the Cat. 5 race Rich Stolz finished mid-pack with a respectible 15 th on GC in his first ever stage race.
It was a fun event, even though I was a little disappointed with my TT time and my utter failure to get any of the sprint bonuses on Sunday. I wish I could have gotten some photos, but we were mostly all on the road at the same time and I wasn't quick enough to catch the finishes of the Women or Cat. 4s.
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