Walterboro, Sc
Walterboro, SC
Today’s race, I was really familiar with. Back in the day with Saturn I did this race twice with the like of Chris Horner, Trent Klasna, Chris Pic, just to name a few and I knew how fast, hard and technical this race would be. Once again the race was delayed so again we started in the dark.
Today’s plan was to work for Kayle because its very obvious he’s one of the better riders in the peloton right now so it would be stupid to race for anyone else.
From the start they threw out $250 dollar prime and lap after lap they gave out $100 dollar primes. The team did a great job staying in the mix and for the most part, I stayed in the top 20-30 making sure Kayle didn’t have to work to hard.
As the speed stayed hi the whole race, counting down the laps where going pretty fast and with 10 to go, I started to feel the effect of staying in the front but I never lost confidence and knew Kayle would need me at the end, so I just sucked it up.
With 6 laps to go, Kayle and I hooked up and he did a great job holding my wheel, even when we got swarmed, which is always the right thing to do, never leave your lead-out man. On the back side going into the finish, we got a bit disorganized and lost good position, with 600meters to go, I hole opened and I yelled to Kayle, lets go. I made the move left and went all out to get top the last two corners first over taking a 5 man lead-out train set by Kodak Sierra Nevada. I hit the second to last turn first and quickly opened up the gap, then the last turn came so quick, I had a gap and put my head down to sprint. I stood up out the corner and started to cramp, so I sat down and motored toward the finish. I never gave up. I went all out all the way to the finish line, but was beat by 2in at the line by Dominique Rollin (Kodakgallery).
I feel good, but at the same time I feel so bad I let the team down. We could have had a NRC victory. Tomorrow will be another day and I hope to continue racing well.
Pro Men
1.Dominique Rollin (Kodakgallery)
2 Rahsaan Bahati (Rock Racing)
3 Josh Thornton (Kodakgallery)
4 Kayle Leogrande (Rock Racing)
5 Ricardo Escuela (Successfulliving.com)
6 Alejandro Borrajo (Rite Aid)
7 Luca Damiani (Colavita-Sutterhome)
8 Frank Travieso (AEG-TOSHIBA-JetNetwork)
9 Cody Stevenson (Jittery Joe's)
10 Jackson Stewart (BMC)