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Team Type 1's Matt Wilson takes the win and the jersey at the Cascade Cycling Classic
Dedicates his win to Ben Brooks
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Team Type 1's Matt Wilson crossed the finish line just ahead of Garmin-Slipstream’s Tom Peterson to win Thursday’s second stage of the Cascade Cycling Classic, and also slipped on the yellow leader’s jersey.
Most important to him, though, was dedicating the wins to Ben Brooks, his Aussie teammate who remains in a nearby hospital in stable condition after a serious crash in the first stage.
Wilson was not the only one to shuffle in the GC, as Levi Leipheimer (Astana), seventh on the stage, is now in second place, followed by former yellow jersey holder Santiago Botero (Rock Racing), Chris Baldwin (Toyota-United), and Bissell's Tom Zirbel.
In the women’s race, an ecstatic Kristin Sanders (Aaron’s) took her first NRC win, crossing the line ahead of Gina Grain (Webcor), Brooke Miller (Team Tibco), Kristin Armstrong (Cervelo Lifeforce), and Julie Beveridge (Aaron’s). The top four in GC remained the same with Armstrong retaining the yellow, followed by Julie Beveridge (Aaron’s), Christine Thorburn (Webcor), and Katheryn Mattis (Webcor). Sanders’ performance on the stage put her in fifth.
Men – A successful break leads to an emotional win
As in Wednesday’s opening stage, attacks started early in stage 2’s 80-mile Three Creeks Road Race. By mile 13, a break of 12 stuck that included Health Net-Maxxis riders Kyle Gritters and Cory Collier; Chris Wherry (Toyota-United), who won Cascade in 2006; Zirbel; Brian Jensen (Successful Living); Wilson and Ukrainian teammate Valeriy Kobzarenko; Peterson and Garmin's Steven Cozza; Andy Jacques-Maynes (California Giant-Specialized); Allen Krughoff (Team Rio Grande); and Brazilian Stefano Barberi (THF).
As the miles rolled by, the break “was working well together,” according to Wilson, gradually increasing the gap to a maximum of 4 minutes near mile 70. Along the way, they lost just two riders; Jacques-Maynes fell off early after flatting, and Krughoff was dropped at 67 miles.
With the 10 men working steadily together, Cozza was the first to make a jump, and did so at the base of the roughly 5K climb to the finish. “It was a good situation,” he said of the break, and after sharing the load with the others, he was able to bury himself, quickly gaining an 18-second gap on his breakaway companions, allowing teammate Peterson to sit on back in the group.
Collier said that “nobody really panicked” when Cozza made his jump, and “We slowly started to bring him back. As soon as we closed it … Miller and Peterson jumped. I kinda swung off, sat on, sat back just a little bit. Wherry was taking a good pull. Zirbel was coming up, and then I jumped as soon as he caught us … and then I was just dangling.”
Though Collier never quite bridged across to Peterson and Wilson, who continued to battle it out to a sprint finish, he came across the line in third, and was “absolutely happy with it,” saying it was definitely one of his better results.
Meanwhile, back in the peloton, BMC, with no rider in the break, was “doing a great job … chasing, doing what they were supposed to do,” according to Leipheimer. “Then they decided they didn’t want to do the work for Rock Racing because Rock Racing [with Botero in yellow] wasn’t doing anything.” With 10K to go, Astana teammate Chris Horner “went to the front and went really hard for a couple miles with [Cesar] Grajales of Rock Racing. And then with about five and a half K to go, it started getting steep, so I attacked,” he continued.
Botero and Baldwin along with some others stayed with him for awhile, and then “finally came off” at a steep section, so Leipheimer “just tried to finish as quick” as he could, coming across the line in seventh place.
Both Wilson and Team Type 1 Director Ed Beamon made it clear, though, that the day’s glory belonged to hospitalized teammate, Brooks. Wilson said that he and Peterson worked really well together in their sprint to the finish, and “neither of us left anything on the road … I foxed around with him a little bit with a K to go. I just said to him, ‘I have to win the stage. The GC’s secondary to me, so if you want the GC, you just have to drive it.’ … I’m winning for Ben.”
While waiting for the podium, Beamon concurred. “With Ben’s crash yesterday and all, the guys were really thinking about him all day, and so that gave Matt a little bit of extra inspiration. We look forward to giving Ben the news.”
Women – An early successful break
Heading out just five minutes after the men on the same course, the women followed suit with a fast race, with Team Tibco launching attacks as soon as the field passed through a short neutralized zone. “We wanted to get a break off today … we wanted to make it a race,” Miller explained. “From the second they flashed green [at the end of the neutralized start], we started to attack.” They had help from other teams, she said, but her team “kind of got the party going.”
At roughly 15K, a break succeeded, and included Aaron’s teammates Sanders and Alison Testroete, Gina Grain (Webcor), Jane Robertson (Metromint), Brooke Miller (Team Tibco), Martina Patella (ValueAct Capital), and Tricia Bailey (Team SHO-AIR/CVAC).
“Brooke put in a lot of work early on to drive the break,” according to Patella, “and Aaron’s and me drove the break … and after about 50K in, Gina and Brooke sat on, claiming GC contention, and Brooke said she was really tired from yesterday.”
Miller concurred. “We were working the break hard, trying to get it established. And then once it got to about 5 minutes, Gina started sitting on, so I started sitting on, too, because we didn’t want to get Kristin Sanders [just 23 seconds behind Tibco’s Amber Rais on GC] too much time on Amber.”
In addition, Miller said she “shredded herself” in the previous day’s stage trying to get gaps for Rais.
The break gained a maximum lead of just over 6 minutes, and at that point, Webcor began ramping up the pace of the peloton. Though they had Grain — who is headed to Beijing with the Canadian track team and, by her own admittance, is not a climber — in the break, she was not a GC threat. However, the break’s growing gap was a threat to Grain’s teammates Thorburn, Katheryn Mattis, and Janel Holcomb, sitting in the third through fifth spots on GC.
As the break approached the base of the final climb, the accelerated pace of the peloton had brought the gap down to roughly 5 minutes, and at that point, Testroete began hammering in order to help Sanders to the finish. “She really, really set a great tempo,” according to Grain, who said that nobody was able to attack initially.
Miller agreed and said she was “just hanging on by a thread.”
The pace whittled the break down to four: Miller, Testroete, Sanders, and Grain. “Alison was just doing a great job pushing the pace … And so it was one of those things … if I’m getting dropped, I might as well attack, so I attacked. Kristin and Gina went with me and then countered me, and I couldn’t go with their counter, but then Alison dropped after that.”
She didn’t want Testroete to catch her, so the sprinter who also races with the National Team in Europe, picked up the pace to try to stay on the podium. She succeeded, coming across the line after Sanders and Grain.
Sanders said that Aaron’s came into the day anticipating that teams who didn’t have anyone in the previous day’s break would keep the race aggressive, and they determined to protect Beveridge’s second place in the GC.
“That was our A-1 priority, to take care of Julie,” she said, “so the break was perfect for us.” And additionally, it was Sanders’ first NRC win — “I’m beside myself!” she exclaimed while clutching the six-pack of beer that winners receive on the podium.
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Back in the peloton, Armstrong, in the yellow jersey, came into the day with a 5:32 lead over Sanders, the highest placed member of the break. Given that she was riding without teammates, she gave Webcor time to make the move when the break was away — which they did when the break reached almost 6:30. “They had to do something at some point,” Armstrong said, “because Kristin Sanders can time trial, so you don’t want to give her too much.”
Armstrong broke away from the main group with roughly 10K to go, and said that Beveridge and Thorburn stayed with her for a few hundred meters, but she broke free, and went into “TT mode.” She said she just “stayed focused and tried to pick girls off” as she made her way up the climb and through members of the break, crossing the line in fourth place with her GC lead still safely in place.
Race Notes:
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Both fields dealt with some confusing directions from race officials on the stage. In the men’s race, officials accidentally directed the men’s 12-man break into an incorrect turn roughly 40 miles into the course. Officials immediately recognized their mistake, and succeeded in getting the group back on course, though Mike Tamayo, Health Net-Maxxis’ director, estimated that they may have lost roughly 30 seconds due to the mistake. They still retained a solid gap, however, and the main group was directed correctly on the course.
In the women’s race, Kelly McDonald (Touchstone Climbing), a biology professor at California State University, Sacramento, crossed the finish line before anyone else — but knew as she did so that she was not the winner. She was off the front of the peloton by herself for over 30 miles, attempting to bridge to the break, but was misdirected by two race officials on motorcycles in the town of Sisters prior to the final climb to the finish. The accidental “detour” brought her out of the town ahead of the break. Her team director and officials realized the mistake prior to her arrival at the finish, but at that point, just encouraged her to finish while the officials decided what to do about the mistake.
McDonald said that officials told her director — who is also her husband — that they were assigning her time on the stage based on her estimated average speed and the distance that was cut off the course; this resulted in taking 3:30 off her time, putting her 10th on the stage and 11th in the GC. Though obviously disappointed because she was confident she would have caught the break, McDonald said that she appreciated that the officials acknowledged their mistake, and that she feels good about her performance and her team’s performance at the race. She said her place in the GC isn’t as important as her team making an impact on the race, and she feels they’ve been riding strong, and will continue to.
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