Prior to the race, Mike, Paul and myself had a plan to attack on the hills and get away from the pack. Mike and I pushed the pace for the first couple of laps and had the field broken down to about half by attacking on every hill. On the third lap I relaxed a litttle and a few other guys did some pulling. At the end of the third lap, as we began going up the hill to the finish, Mike attacked hard and no one followed him. We had 1 lap left, which was about 8 miles. Mike was able to put a quarter to half mile gap on the rest of the field. I felt pretty good about my position, as I could sit back and let my teammate go and wait for any other moves. The field began to work together and try to bring Mike back in. We had about 10 guys and about 4-5 were rotating off the front trying to catch Mike. I enjoyed being able to sit back and let them work. With 1-2 miles left we finally caught up to Mike and it was going to come down to a 12 man sprint. As we approached the first of the 2 final hills I stood up and went for it. I got a little lead on the field, but we regrouped at the bottom of the last hill. There were about 8 guys together and I didn’t want to make the first move. One guy took off (way too early) and I got right on his wheel. As he began to die I came around, but still had a long way to go. I was in the lead with about 100m to go and had at least 1 person on my wheel. As we approached the finish line 2 guys started to make their moves. I pushed as hard as I could and was able to hold them off for the win. Mike ended up finishing 10th because his solo effort took a lot out of him. Looking back on the race, I have a lot learn. I worked way too hard the first 2 laps and was way too early on sprint finish. It all worked out for the best this time, but I am looking forward to racing smarter.

Dan K