Tour de Champaign

Before I can even talk about the racing I first have to give a huge thanks to Mark Swartzendruber for organizing another great year for the Tour de Champaign. He really does know how to put on a good event. Even though the turnout wasn't as good as the last two years, I still think it was a great weekend with some hard racing. This year I thought the courses were awesome, and in my opinion they were the best courses we've had so far. Seriously, for anyone that decides to skip the Tour de Champaign next year, they're missing out on some of the best crit racing in the midwest.

So here's how it played out on Saturday. We had three guys racing for ABD including myself, Ben Damhoff, and Bryan McVey, against a field of about 30 riders. There was definitely some firepower with 5-6 Nuvo guys, Josh Carter, and Dave Williams of Bissell lining up at the start. This next bit might sound like I attacked and completely destroyed the field, but it's actually a little different than that. I was front row at the line and when the whistle blew, I kind of sprinted to the front and took the first two turns fast. What I was really trying to do was be in the top 5 guys those first couple of laps, as it was a pretty technical course with five turns in half a mile. In reality I ended up soloing off the front the next three laps, taking all the corners at crazy speeds, until eventually I saw Jonathan Jacob of Nuvo bridging up to me. By the time we got together and started taking pulls, we had about 15 seconds on the field. Jonathan was pulling through like a madman and it was all I could do just to hang on. I think I was pulling about half a lap for every 2-3 laps he would pull. We were pulling ahead and soon had 25 seconds, then 30, then we were about to lap the field. It was clear that Jonathan could have done this on his own, so in all fairness I said to him, "I'll let you take the win, no need to attack. I promise I won't contest the sprint, just let me get second." He nodded and this gave me some relief knowing that he wasn't going to try to attack me (if I had taken equal pulls with him, I'm pretty sure I would've dropped myself).

^One of the few laps I pulled

^One of the many laps he pulled

So we lap the field and soon learn that Dave Williams broke away and is about 20 seconds behind the field with Jeff Schroetlin trying to hold him back. Even with Schroetlin, who's also on Nuvo, trying to slow him down and just sit on, Williams was still gaining ground. I told my teammates to get to the front and keep the pace high, along with Jonathan's teammates who had the same idea. Eventually we make it to the final lap without letting Dave Williams catch us, and I slip back in the bunch to take second. When the race was over I was more than happy with second place. Jonathan was obviously much stronger than me and he deserved the win.

The next day was not so great. After registering, warming up and getting to the start line on time, the officials had to make the executive decision to cancel both the Cat 3 and the Cat 1/2 race due to some strong thunderstorms that were coming our way and a three-hour tornado watch. It's a shame that the Tour de Champaign had to end that way, not being able to put on the final races on what I thought was one of the coolest courses I've ever seen. Well, maybe next year.

Ben looking focused before Sunday's race got cancelled