Race Report: We Are The Champions

By Martin • August 9th, 2010

It was a great weekend for District Velocity Racing p/b The Bike Rack, if only because we claimed an important title during the punishing Page Valley Road Race — Cat 4 MABRA Road Race Champions.

Yep, champions. Corey took second place in the race, but given that the first place finisher was on a non-MABRA team, his strong performance won him the area’s most coveted road race award. And we couldn’t be prouder, both of his accomplishment and the teamwork that it took to get him there. Corey was joined by Matt, Chas, Troy, and Marcus, all of whom did the right amount of work at the right moments to make it count. Matt also claimed tenth, after burying himself to set up Corey’s final move in the closing mile of the race. We’ll be happy to see Corey slip on the champions jersey when he gets it early next year.

In the Cat 3 race, Dennis placed fourth, while Grayson, still on the road to full recovery, put in a brave ride and came in for 16th. Tony nailed 18th, while Kevin, who put in a huge chase on a dangerous breakaway late in the race, placed 26th. I dropped a chain and dropped myself, but in preferring a DFL to a DNF, came in 44th, ahead of only nine other guys. We also had Amy take on some of the local women, and she deserves a big high-five for making this one of her first road races. Quite a place to learn, huh?

Marcus took a lot of great pictures of lots of the different races, and Grayson caught Corey’s strong sprint to the finish during the road race on video.

The crit was less well-attended, but Chas and Troy braved the 35+, while Chas (yeah, he doubled up) and Matt survived the Cat 4 shell-fest (Matt took fifth). I rode in a tiny Cat 3 field, and pulled the plug after something like seven laps. Apparently my desire to not DNF from the day prior was quickly diminished every time we had to sprint up the main hill on the course. Congrats to GamJams’ Greg Wittwer for a solid solo win, and Ben Reynolds from CycleLife/Raw Talent Ranch for almost — almost! — catching him in the final laps.

All told, Page Valley and its promoters delivered a great race weekend — again. The road race is about as hard as they get, and the crit, well, it’s about as epic as they get. Sadly, the fields were somewhat small, but I’d wager that it’ll be on the calender for next year and will draw much bigger crowds. There’s simply no other crit in the area that’s all up or down, and lots of local riders who otherwise dislike crits should take solace in the fact that this course does not favor people who can sprint real fast in the final few hundred meters.