Masters Cheemo RR

[Eugenehahn]

The masters event is coupled to the Cat3, Cat 4 and U17 race which made for a rather large 80 so or starters on the line. From the gun the pace was on and as in the pro race, half of the field was eliminated on laps 1 or 2, leaving a group of thirty mixed cat riders to contest the race. The danger riders for me were Vince Marcotte (Langois) and Tripleshotter Riley Pickrell so I rode the first half keeping a close eye on those two riders. Vince attacked at the turn onto kangaroo on lap 4 and being a masters 30-39 there was a lot of looking to that group to go get him, which there was no response. I was beginning to have memories of BC RR champs (where the masters groups prefer to race like scared children hiding from the wind rather then men making brave moves) so I committed to reeling him on the lap 5 start climb. I was near the front and went with an attack (Brian Geerts I believe) up the start finish climb, and then to my surprise rode past him and lead the climb into the downhill. I kept it full gas through the technical turns onto Liberty and then settled into the climb. I didn't even fall back that much which I now know meant I was having a good day and that I would have to do some work. The next two laps I stayed at the front and lead two more climbs (wtf?) eventually leading to Vince's catch. A counter attack by Riley and Erik up the last Liberty climb went off the front, and with most of the group being masters/cat3 there was only a few to chase. ProCity did keep them close but as we turned onto Rocky Point for the last time I knew we wouldn't catch them, so I waited to see what was up in the sprint. At about 600m to go the group was fanning out and I figured that nobody had much left so I went with the early early move up the outside and got a significant gap right off. The next 30 s took forever as I slowly melted down...just holding on as the group began to sprint in earnest. With 25m to go I risked a glance and saw that despite the fact I could barely pedal the group had left it too late and I rolled over the line a couple of ticks behind the kids but in front of the rest of the old guys. That felt good.