Spectacular Review

The Spring Series Spectacular went off without a hitch on Sunday.A huge thanks goes out to the volunteers (without whom none of this would have happened), Transcend Coffee and Hammer Nutrition.

The weather was a little threatening, but the worst thing that actually came were some strong winds. But it’s Alberta, what would a road race be without wind?? We had just over 30 racers out on the day, with 10 As, a bunch of Bs, and only 3 Cs. We settled on the As doing 8 laps and the combined Bs and Cs doing 6.

I don’t really know what happened in that B/C race, because the amazing volunteers let me race the A race. So if anybody has any interesting comments or reports feel free to share. But I do have some semi-official results (I’ve been wrong once before, so don’t hold me to it):

1. David Roberts (Hardcore)

2. ERTC Wilier

3. ERTC Devinci

4. ERTC Jamie

5. Samuel Beaudoin (Juventus)

The A race was exciting given the fact there were only 10 of us. Adam said it’s kind of like being in the break for 100km. I guess so… Robin and Nick seemed to be the most aggressive and strongest guys. Mr. Barr was his usual wily self. Bruce “TT” Copeland even threw in a couple serious attacks. The race really came down to the 53×12 tailwind stretch and the match sprint-style cat-and-mouse headwind stretch. There were a couple attacks and lots of hard parts of the race, but in the end it mostly came down to the finishing straight. I was sitting on Blaine’s wheel, guttered, thinking I should come around him and sprint for the line. As I thought about doing just that I found him just riding me off his wheel. Then Geoff came around, then Nick came around. So much for a group sprint… how about a group suffer-into-the-headwind-and-slowly-cross-the-finish-line? Yeah… and that’s it how went:

1. Blaine Richter (ERTC)

2. Geoff MacDonald (ERTC)

3. Nick Jendzjowsky (PRW)

4. Shaun Adamson (Juventus)

5. Sean Barr (PRW)

Thanks again to everyone coming out and having a good time. Thanks again to the volunteers who gave up their Sunday morning!!

I also think race organizing is something that everybody should do. Even this small race that didn’t really require that much work is a good experience. My appreciation of the efforts of race organizers and volunteers over the last years has increased, but until you do it yourself, you just don’t really understand. And without all these wonderful people helping out and giving up their time, the wonderfulness of bike racing just wouldn’t happen. So get out, do your part, and thank those who do so much more!!!

::SAdamson