Gold Nugget Stage Race

Stage 1: Mass start hillclimb

The hillclimb started at 5pm and was 9 miles long with 6 miles of rolling hills and a steep 3 mile climb. At the start, I sat in the group to not waste any energy, then when the hill started, I began to ride at a fast pace and when we only had less than halfway up the climb to go, it was only Chris Flanagan (Team Swift) and me. I attacked him several times, but he matched all of them. I didn't know where the finish line was and when I saw an official near the top I started sprinting. Unfortunately, my sprint was too early and Chris won by 5 seconds plus a 3 sec bonus time, so I was 8 seconds off Chris.

Stage 2: Greeley Hill RR

It was a 5 mile loop with only one climb at the end and we had to do nine laps for a total of 45 miles.

The first half of the race I sat in and followed attacks. With 5 laps to go there was a breakaway

of two riders: Bjorn Fox and Alex Freund. I attacked and only Tyler Hanson could follow. We worked together to catch the breakaway and when we did we all started working together. With 2 laps to go Alex and Tyler were dropped. With one lap to go Bjorn broke away and I couldn't catch him. He went over the top first. I knew he was 1:02 behind me from the day before and when I crossed the finish line to take 2nd place, he was 19 seconds behind me in the GC. Chris caught Tyler and Alex and got 3rd in the stage, and he was now 33 seconds behind me in the GC, making me the leader.

Stage 3: Toll Road TT

Stage 3 was in the afternoon after stage 2. I started out with a steady pace, but was tired because of the RR I had done in the morning. I got 2nd in the stage and Chris won by 23 seconds over me, leaving me with only a 10 second lead. That was a problem because the time bonuses for the last stage were 20s for 1st, 10s for 2nd, and 5s for 3rd, which means I could not let him win the final stage because that would tie us and then he would win because of the stage wins.

Stage 4: Bootjack RR

A 12 mile loop with 1,300 ft of climbing and we did 3 laps for a total of 36 miles and 3,900 ft of climbing. I decided to stay behind Chris for the whole race and watch him. Best would be to have a field sprint so he couldn't take the time bonus but the chances of that happening were slim because of the climbing.

Many people attacked and Chris chased them down, while I sat on his wheel saving energy. With one lap to go more attacks followed from Bjorn Fox who now was over minute behind me on GC. Chris chased them down again and I still stayed on his wheel. I attacked once when Chris was in the back, and got away from the field. I let Chris chase me down.

The last attack came from a SoCal rider on one of the climbs. Chris climbed at his max speed and flew right past him, dropping everyone in the field except me. He asked me to work with him to get away from the others but I didn't lift a finger. He then pulled me all up the last hill, where there was a right turn with about 200m to go, all of it uphill. Just before the right turn, I came around him and took the turn as narrow as I could go. I sprinted to the line and won by 2 seconds and got a 10 second time bonus over him, increasing my lead to 22 seconds to win the GC and a stage win.

Next time we should get the rest of the team to come,

Great race for team work.