Merco/McLane Race Reports

Race: Merco / McLane Downtown Crit.
Category: Elite 2 (field size 120)
Team: Bruce Wilford, Rob MacNeill, Dominic Giampaolo, James Badia, Peter
Dinolfo

Short version: We planned to race for James or Rob. At 1 to go, our team was all close together near the front and James, Rob, Dominic and Peter all were taken out in a crash. I avoided it and got 21st. Nobody was seriously hurt, but Dominic will require dental work for several broken teeth.

Although most of the team had raced together at Snelling, this was my first race of the year. Because of that, I was planning to not be active in the early parts of the race, rather waiting until I had found my race legs. At the team meeting, we discussed racing for James as he has the best sprint and he does well in criteriums. We lined up near the front of the huge field. The race was shortened to 32 laps of the 0.8 mile circuit.

Dominic, Rob, James and Peter went directly to the front and were patrolling for breaks. I was drifting backwards finding the safe lines around the course. This year, they did not have the usual arch of balloons over the chicane, which was one less thing to worry about. The group did not really go that hard and once I had settled in I focused on moving up. At one of the early (maybe even the first) primes, I was on the front with Steve R. (Cal Giant), I asked him if he wanted it and he said no and I did not really want to race for the prime, but he said, "I'll let you gap off", which he did with about 500m to the line and I made a half hearted attempt at the prime, but was passed by several guys who were more serious. During the race Dominic, Peter and Rob all covered or initiated moves. Peter was in the only real break of the day, but as with the others, it was pulled back. James picked up a prime somewhere along the way.

At 8 to go, I ended up rolling off the front and so tried to maintain good pace so that our guys could just follow wheels, after about half a lap of that a prime was announced and although I did almost a complete lap on the front, just trying to be steady, I was caught by 2 guys. I think that effort was a waste. At 3 to go Dominic did most of a lap on the front trying to keep things moving along. Rob, Dominic and Peter were all just in front of James ready for the lead-out. They were on the outside of the bunch, I was still trying to keep to safer lines and was behind them moving up on the inside. At one to go, there was some bumping and about 10 guys went down, including my four teammates. I avoided the crash and got 21st.

I think we rode well as a team, all being active on the front. Spot of bad luck at the end. The team looks great on the new Giants, which handle very quickly and so are really nice for criteriums. Photos at
http://picasaweb.google.com/bruce.wilford/MercoMcLaneWeekend07,
where one shows all five of us are close to the front going through the chicane.

Dan Martin was 6th. Eric Barlevav from VRC won the race.


Race: Merco / McLane Roadrace
Category: Elite 2 (field size 120)
Team: Bruce Wilford, Rob MacNeill, Dominic Giampaolo, Peter Dinolfo

Short version: We planned to race for me or Rob. Rob had a mechanical. I did not position sufficiently well, getting 18th, Peter got 25th, Dominic 70th.

We planned for me to sit in for the first 2 laps and then planned to be more active at the front in the later part of the race. I sat at the back of the bunch and just tried not to sprint hard out of the corners for the first two laps. Rob, Dominic and Peter covered several early break attempts and I could usually see them up at the pointy end of the peloton. The race was very surgey, with short fast sections and then long slow sections, where everybody just rode easy. Last year there was a strong wind, which made things hard, but this year the wind was light to non-existent and all the moves that went away were just chased down. BPG had an army of guys, seemed as if they had 12 guys in the race, 7 of them finished. On the second lap, Rob hit a pothole and it loosened his brake levers which then jammed his brakes on. He decided that his bike was not safe to race and pulled out, turned around and going back to the feedzone to help the team and other Webcor racers with bottles. The short lived attacks continued, but nothing serious got established. Dominic and Peter covered many of those break attempts. Steve R (Cal Giant) tried going away solo a few times, but after letting him hang for a while, the bunch would go after him.

At half a lap to go, I tried to get a Davis guy, Elliott (BPG), Steve and myself to start to work together, but after one pull each, it sort of fizzled. The final time up the hill, the speed increased and the usual "sit-up" at the top did not happen. Peter and I approached the final two little rollers together, trying to move up, me on the very left, him on the right. With the pace not being that fast, and everybody waiting for the sprint, the road became tight with people and although I had moved up a little, I had left it to late. As we entered the final 1km, there was a bunch of pushing and at 800m, Nate Rogers hit the deck pretty hard. I braked and swerved around it, An arête guy did a huge bunny hop over Nate's bike, getting about 2 feet off the road, his back tire exploded on landing though. Peter got caught up a little worse than I did. After the crash I climbed over the hill, passed a few people in the final 300m, but ended up 18th, with Peter close behind.

I think we rode well as a team, followed our plan well and we were able to communicate well during the race. Sean Mazich (Waste Management) won the race.

The lessons from this race are that we should have worked a little more closely with some of the other teams to make a unified attempt at a break, which would have improved our chances and also made it harder for the pile of single riders just sitting in and waiting until the end as well as making it safer for all those involved.

Thanks for reading

Bruce