Saturday, April 23, 2016

Joe Martin Stage Race Stages 1-2

Over the past couple days the Lupus Racing Team has been racing the Joe Martin Stage Race. It is a 4 day stage race in Fayetteville, AR that features a 3 mile uphill TT, 2 110 mile rolling road races, and a criterium on the final day of racing. We fielded a team of 7 riders that included Michael Olheiser, Barry Miller, Bryan Lewis, Evan Murphy, Oliver Flautt, Jonah Mead Van Cort, and myself.

The time trial was a pretty straightforward effort. It was uphill for a few kilometers, had a false flat downhill, and dragged uphill for about 800 meters to the line. The key was to give it full gas over that false flat downhill. Our team placed Bryan in 17th at 37 seconds, Mike in 21st at 38 seconds, and Evan in 44th at 51 seconds. It wasn't our best day. I expected to get more out of myself, but I gave it my best and that is all I can do. Jamis ended up taking the win with Janier Acevedo.

Stage 2 was 110 miles over rolling terrain and had a 9 mile 2%-3% stair step climb that finished with about 25 miles left to race. The plan for the day was to put Oliver, Mike, or Bryan into a break. The race started off fast from the gun. The first 20km were on a highway and guys were killing it trying to go off the front. Oliver and Bryan did a great job making it into all these small moves. I positioned myself near the front in case one of our guys missed a split. We turned onto some smaller roads and Mike was positioned near the front. He went into a move of 20 guys at this point and that was the move of the day. The peloton was not happy with this move, and Jamis put a couple riders into the move. That meant Jamis did not control the pace, and the pace was very fast for most of the day. Barry made it into a group of 6, but the peloton went bananas and caught that group. Finally the pace settled down, and I thought to myself "This is one of the hardest races I've ever done." At that point I realized my front brake had been rubbing. I loosened my brakes and the race became a lot easier. We turned onto the highway for the final 40 miles and the 9 mile climb. It was a headwind, so that meant the pace would be easy on the climb as Silber set pace to reel in the break. During the final 10km Bryan and I stayed close to Evan as he saved energy off of teams doing the work at the front. With a few km to go I jumped into the wind with Bryan and Evan in tow until 2km to go. Bryan took over from there and delivered Evan into the final tight turns in third wheel. Evan took third in the field sprint for 6th place as three of the breakaway riders just survived to the line. Jamis ended up taking the win again with Sebastian Haedo. We were happy with the day because all the riders did their jobs and we delivered Evan where he wanted to be at the end of the race.

Today we have another 110 mile stage with 4 laps on a circuit that features a steep climb each lap. I am sure it will be a fun one.

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