Cat's Hill

(Posted By Viktor Rapinskii)

About halfway through the race I saw a break go and I thought that was the end of that. Luckily it had Elliot in it, and Sergei told me that if it comes down to a sprint between those 4, our chances are really good, since one of the other riders was James Mattis (Cal Giant). After that a flurry of attacks brought the break back and closer to the end 2 riders kind of just rolled off the front. I was told they're not really dangerous and we kind of just let them dangle out there for a while and I knew it would come back. Sitting in the pack, I saw Mike Sayers do a lot of the work, which only meant that Jackson Steward was feeling good for the sprint. I didn't think I had that great of a condition to contest the field sprint, so I wanted to take a chance. Throughout the whole race I was paying attention to the riders around me and analyzing where on the course they are the most tired. It turned out that right after the hill, when you make the first right turn along the park, that's where everyone would usually catch their breath, and that's where I decided to attack. I brought 2 guys with me and 2 laps later we bridged up to the front two, thus making 5.

I knew at that point, that if we were to come back, I had about 8 teammates that were still in the race with a legitimate shot at the win. When I heard that our gap started growing, all 5 of us in the break stepped on the gas. With 1 to go, I knew I wanted to be first before the final turn and opened up the throttle on the downhill. I think I caught the others by surprise as they must've thought that was too early and the finishing straight is long, but when you're on the downhill like that, you can start your sprint even at 500 meters, because you carry a lot of momentum. I flew out of the last corner already a bike length ahead of the other 4 and just kept that advantage to the finish line.

Thank you for a great race, I can't wait till the next weekend.

Viktor Rapinskii