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This past weekend was one of Southern California's most prominent local stage races, the San Dimas Stage Race (SDSR). This stage race has been most commonly used by the NRC caliber professionals for last minute preparations for the NRC opener at the Redlands Cycling Classic. Even more special to this race this year was the surprise heat wave that hit the area very hard along with a little more wind than usual.

The 3-day stage race starts with a TT up the infamous Glendora Mountain Road (GMR), a rolling, technical circuit race around Bonelli Park, and fast downtown crit in Old Town San Dimas. 7 out of 9 Team NCCF/ Specialized Juniors raced in the Elite 2's (Sean is on the DL with a broken wrist and Christopher in Colombia for MTB Pan-American Championships). I finished 8th on stage one, a ways off of 1st place but within 50 seconds of 2nd place. The team went into stage 2 looking for a stage win and improving my GC position to get on to the podium. More than half the team had unfortunate day of racing resulting from mistimed flats to crashes but this is cycling, these things happen, and one must learn to adjust to the situation. After multiple attempts of breaking the field up over the KOM climb (Heckler Hill), a group of juniors finally got a little group going but with some riders not fully committing the main field was coming back together. The yellow jersey (Brandon McNaulty) pulled a cheeky "Geraint Thomas" move as I was pulling off the front and countered the group as we were getting caught. It was a hard chase but the yellow jersey had the stronger legs so Jules and I finished safely in the main field. After this stage I moved up from 8th to 6th on GC, 3 seconds off of the 5th podium spot.

The last stage contained two Hot Spot Sprints with time bonuses at each of them. The goal was for me to obtain at least one of them to take over 5th on GC. The first Hot Spot Sprint was taken by teammate Grant out of a breakaway which allowed me a good warm-up for the second Hot Spot Sprint. The Vumedi rider that sat in 5th GC had all of his teammates watching me. I can personally say that they did a stellar job in doing so and made my effort to win a time bonus very hard. I eventually won the second Hot Spot Sprint to snag the 3 seconds, but the Vumedi rider that sat in front of me on GC put in a very strong effort to get 3rd and take a 1 second time bonus. I finished safely in the field to take 6th GC at the 2015 San Dimas Stage Race in the Elite 2's race.

This stage showed our teams aggression and really showed how close races can finish in GC. In my case, I lost a podium position by one second but I am content knowing that because the team and I raced hard and did what we could to take advantage of trying to improve on GC.

I would like to thank NCCF for the financial support over the past weekend. Specialized bicycles for our brand new Allez's. Larry Nolan for his continued direction and help setting up our new bikes. And one last thank you to my parents for allowing my team to stay and invade our house.

On to Sea Otter,
Nick Castellano