- HOT TOPICS:
- The new VeloNews.com (BETA)
Redlands Crit: BMC's Jackson Stewart and Columbia's Ina Yoko Teutenberg win at Redlands
BMC takes two spots on the stage podium and keeps Louder atop the GC; Teutenberg takes her second stage.
- Article Extras
- Photos
- Results
- Race Index
Jeff Louder (BMC) and Amber Neben (Nurnberger Shoair) retained their yellow jerseys after the dust settled in bunch sprints for both the men’s and women’s Redlands Downtown Criteriums in Saturday’s stage 2 at the Redlands Cycling Classic.
The top five in the men’s GC remained virtually unchanged, while Neben’s advantage over second placed Ina-Yoko Teutenberg (Columbia-High Road) narrowed from 14 seconds to just 2 seconds due to time bonuses.
Louder’s team, however, did much more than protect his lead, as teammates Jackson Stewart and Brent Bookwalter took first and third on the stage, respectively, while Andrew Pinfold (OUCH-Maxxis) stood in the second spot on the podium.
Teutenberg, a 34-year-old German who is arguably one of the best female sprinters in the world, was joined on the podium by five-time US national criterium champion Tina Pic (Colavita/Sutter Home p/b Cooking Light) in second, and Canadian Olympian Gina Grain (Webcor Builders) in third.
While Friday’s grueling and windy stage surely took a lot out of them, the men’s peloton had no choice but to hammer when the men of Louder’s BMC squad took to the front right from the starting shot. With just 35 seconds separating the top 10 on GC, other teams still in contention for the overall, such as Bissell, Fly V Australia, Rock Racing, Garmin-Holoweko Partners-Felt, OUCH-Maxxis, and Jelly Belly made BMC work to stay there. And work they did, as the average speed for 43 laps around the 1-mile course was 28 to 29 miles per hour.
Stewart said BMC was never too worried about any attempted breaks, as the forced pace took care of things naturally. “The attacks were never too dangerous and Jeff was calling all the shots on the road,” he said. “Our guys were riding so good that they should have let some stuff go, and weren’t. We kept trying to let some stuff go, but the pace was kind of high and things were coming back on their own.”
The first substantial break came roughly 35 minutes in, when a group of nine riders broke away and quickly grew to thirteen strong. Their gap, though, never grew to more than about 10 seconds, and when Bissell’s Ben Jacques-Maynes, who was sitting in seventh place just 28 seconds back, bridged, the field came back together quickly. Stewart pointed out that Jacques-Maynes’s bridge confused BMC initially, as half the squad thought it was his identical twin brother, Andy, who also rides for Bissell. “Once everyone believed me and some of the other guys that it was Ben, we didn’t even really have to rev it up because it (the break) killed itself,” he said.
With just two laps to go, Kirk O’Bee (Bissell) took a solo flyer, and maintained an eight-second gap for just over one lap, getting swallowed up with less than 500 meters to go.
Almost like dominoes, however, first Jelly Belly and then Colavita/Sutter Home had some crashes. “Jelly Belly was in the front and then somebody crashed,” Louder said. “I don’t know what the deal was, but somebody dumped it in the chicane corner, and then Colavita took over, and then they crashed in the u-turn corner. But things worked out for us. To win you gotta be strong, but you need a little luck, too,” he explained.
Louder’s BMC squad managed to say safe and came to the front again. “Me and Brent were right there,” Stewart said. “We missed both crashes and kinda moved up slowly, and then it was Ouch left to lead out Pinfold, and me and Brent were right on ‘em. Brent just gave me a little pull and I came around ‘em and scored.”
Louder said that though he has nothing but confidence in his team, he is not taking anything for granted in Sunday’s Sunset Road Race. “I’m not discounting anybody in the top 10, or even in the top 20,” he said. “There’s a lot of good riders here, and everyone’s up for this race. We’ve got to respect the peloton, and just ride our best race. If we can do what we set out to do, if we can follow our tactics and stick together, I think we can do it.”
Ina, Tina, and Gina
It’s not too often that the names of the three racers on the stage podium rhyme, but that’s how it worked out after the women’s 60-minute race stayed together to end in a bunch sprint. With an average speed of 26 miles per hour during the 24-lap race, there were no successful attacks, but enough pressure in the peloton to blow about 15 riders off the back of the field about 32 minutes into the race.
“It was too fast for attacks to go,” Teutenberg said while waiting for the podium. “It was pretty obvious it would come down to a bunch sprint.”
She said that teams began setting their sprinters up with about two laps to go. “It was pretty much Tina, Gina, and me up front there. I had Kim there, and Webcor took over … and I was able to get on the Webcor lead-out. I was pretty much the first sprinter on the finishing straight, and it’s a really short finish stretch, so it’s hard to make up the bike lengths you’ve fallen behind once you get around the corner.”
Both Pic and Grain said they made minor mistakes in the final few turns. “I kinda messed up, I think,” Pic said. “I needed to go a little bit earlier.” She ended up on Teutenberg’s wheel, and agreed with Teutenberg that making up those extra bike lengths after the last corner is a long shot.
Grain said her mistake involved a miscalculation, too. Her plan was to “leave a gap and slingshot off Teutenberg’s wheel. “I didn’t leave enough of a gap, and it didn’t give me enough speed to pass Ina … I think my plan backfired, and my slingshot was for Tina!” she said with a laugh.
Neben, who races the majority of the season in Europe, agreed that numerous teams took turns throughout the race to do the work at the front.
Though the field stayed together, prime laps as well as three sprinter’s points laps made for some exciting sprints to the line. Seehafer (Team Type 1) was first across the line for each of the sprinter’s laps, bringing her just 2 points from taking the green sprinter’s jersey away from Teutenberg, whose stage win points bonus kept her in the lead.
Sunday: Time bonuses could be critical … again
Coming into the Saturday 14 seconds down on Neben, two time bonuses in the second stage have brought Teutenberg within just 2 seconds. Last year, Teutenberg’s Canadian teammate Alex Wrubleski took the overall win at Redlands from teammate Mara Abbott on the last day — by just 1 second, with time bonuses.
The decrease in her lead did not take Neben by surprise. “I knew after yesterday, I probably would have the yellow jersey by one second after today,” she said with a laugh while waiting for the podium presentation. “Ina’s probably the best sprinter in the world, or one of the best. I knew what to expect today.”
Sunday features the Beaver Medical Group Sunset Road Race. Women will do 106 km and men will do 147 km.
"It's getting close," said Teutenberg. "It's all coming down to time bonus seconds. Now we just have to try to stay with (Amber) Neben on the climbs tomorrow. It's a tough course but we'll give it our best."
"We have Mara (Abbott) within 40 seconds on GC too and Alex (Wrubleski) who won the final stage last year can do something tomorrow. So we know what we're up against. We just have to try everything."
Related
