Modesto Road Race

Randy, British Dave, and I lined up for this hot flat central valley sprint fest. After two laps of constant attacking from the field everyone decided nothing was going to get away and the peleton settled in for a cruisy morning. Every once in a while someone would decide that a break might work afer all and attack, but to no avail as Daniel Holloway(VMG/Felt) was too angry at everyone for stting on his wheel every time he did anything - as well as the fact that BPG worked him over the previous day in the crit, with Victor Rapinski getting the win – so he almost single handedly kept the race together. Clint Rogers was my savior sitting in the feed zone today as it was at least 90 degrees out there. I must have drank 9 bottles in the 3 hour race. Unfortunateley Randy flatted about halfway through the race and couldn’t get back to the field. With about a lap and a half left in the eight lap race I got into a good group of 7 attacking riders that was rolling through well together at over thirty mph, but after five minutes or so of freedom we were reeled back in, cementing the certainty of a field sprint in my mind. As we went through the bell for the final lap Joel Robertson attacked and tried to draw out some others to go with him, but nobody else wanted to challenge the McGuire train which was controlling the front for their sprinter Darren Basso. McGuire burned through all of their men keeping Joel at 20 seconds for the last lap and didn’t save anyone beseides Darren for the sprint which proved costly for them. After catching the cat 4s and Joel with 2km to go we had to race sise by side with the cat 4s, who were going into their finish as well, as the moto escort were taking care of a big crash in the 4s field that had just happened. At 1k to go British Dave put the nail in the coffin of the McGuire train by drilling it hard up the left hand gutter. There was a lot of elbow banging going into the last corner at 250 meters to go, but I ended up coming through in 4th, on Danny’s wheel. John Wilk opened up the sprint up the right of the road and Danny went left. We easily passed John and I came out of Danny’s slipstream with fifty meters to go, but didn’t have the power to come around the sprinting beast that is Daniel Holloway. Oh well, second in a road race is not too bad.

Berkeley Hills RR, or..."Damn, that hurt!"

After another week of having my ass kicked by school, largely ignoring my bike (maybe 5 hrs this week before today if Im lucky) and a last minute SOS plea from work to come in and cover, I had officially decided that Berkeley Hills would not be in my best interest, and that I wasnt going. That was until the ride I had arranged for Dave called at 7 Sat. night and said he wasnt going. So against my better judgement I drug my sad sorry self out of the house with Dave in tow and headed to the east bay oh so early this mother's day morning to race. Logan was on hand, and Viktor made a brief appearance, but after trying to pay with a credit card and getting shot down, apparently took off before any of us could try and sort him out, so that made the squad myself, Logan and Dave for the day. And off we went...

After about three miles the signature Pat Briggs early move went, and as they usually come back quick enough my initial thought was to leave it but once one Nate English, followed by Taylor Kuphaldt from Davis joined the fun I figured it would be wise to have somebody there and followed suit, we had a few others along for a total of seven, and were joined after a half a lap by Jesse Moore of Cal Giant. At this point I was wondering if this early move was gonna come back after all, and after the first lap when we were joined by another 8 including Mike Sayers, Ozzy Olmos and a couple of other strong dudes, I knew that this was not the early move, but THE MOVE, and I was a bit worried.

From here I can make a long story short, I lasted till the 3rd time over momma bear, with Sayers, Moore, English, and Kuphaldt pushing the pace couldnt hack it and came off just behind a few other guys that couldnt take the heat either. From here I did almost 2 laps solo, catching a couple of guys, and being caught by a couple of guys, until...The last time up the climb I was caught by half of what was "the field", and then about 1k from the line the other half of "the field" to finish of those in the race at all, for 26th place.

Not so surprised to be honest, although given my recent lack of training it could have been a lot worse. Unfortunately I was the only of us three to finish making it not exactly a banner day for BPG. Sorry for the bad news, but on the bright side school is essentially over this week, and I feel confident that with a good block of training in me Ill be properly ready to "race" race again.

Hope everybody is having a good Sunday, see ya next time

Sean.

Oh yeah, and in case you were curious the places that matter went something like:
1. Nate English (damn, this kid is something else)
2. Jesse Moore
3. Taylor Kuphaldt
4. Mike Sayers
5. Ozzy Olmos
6. Jonathon Eropkin (him and Ozzy may be the other way around)
7. Mark Burnham

thats all i know for sure, later dudes

EBC Criterium

Todays was a pretty fun race. It seemed like at all times we had the race under control, basically what ever we wanted we got until the last lap. Viktor was amazing, once again showing amazing time trial power. There were alot of breaks going and we always had atleast one person in them leaving no work for us to do. Along with Viktor, Justin and Josh were bolth riding very strong.

Anyways the race was a usual crit with many atacks early in the race, ususally the break would just get too big and the group would chase them down. Nearly the whole race though Victor was up the road which was very nice because it was up to everyone else to bring the breaks back. However being that we were the team with numbers it left more people trying to single handedly bridge to the breaks and all we had to do was follow wheels so if anyone got to it, we would just have another one there. Once we caught the break there were a few counters. Soon enough it was 3 laps to go. At this point Viktor launched a huge atack and was solo. It looked like he would make it for a little bit but soon enough he was caught and we were trying to get organzied for the sprint. I saw randy and a few other guys trying to get in the "sweet spot" and I went and joined. I thought we had a good group getting ready to lign it up but when I looked back, they had gotten boxed off my wheel. With 500 meters to go I was sittin in about 4th posistion waiting patiently when someone (cough cough) came up and decided to jock for posistion and while doing it let a little gap go. I ended up taking 3rd in the sprint. Although not a win, still a very fun race

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