Snelling Road Race…Team Wins it’s First!
Nine riders from Body Concepts Race Team lined up for the start of the Snelling Road Race on 2-27-10 in the Masters 45+ 4/5 category eager, anxious and hopeful.
The first major player of the day, the weather, turned out to be perfect, as in no rain 
~60 degrees with mild wind. The course was ~ 12-miles per lap and we did 4-laps in our race. There were several attacks by other teams that were covered by our 4-designated team members effectively and we had a couple of team members off the front (Carlos and Steve) causing other teams to chase. Matt and Randy F showed their experience pulling back several breaks and Dave road a very smart race moving forward as riders advanced covering several surges/attacks during the 4-laps.
On the final lap the pace picked up significantly and we struggled a little getting together as the finish approached trying not to get blocked in and get our leadout train organized, Brad and Steve helped get us to the front. With about 2-k to go we were all near the front and had about 7-of us lined up…we did not pull the trigger as we had hoped at that point and a group started moving up the left side of the road as we went through the 1-k to go mark. Rick and I moved over into this line 5-riders back from the front. My job was to pull the leadout train through the last corner so at the 500-meter point I took off to pull Rick and any other team mates through the last turn. I went through the turn with good speed and looked back to see if Rick was on my wheel…he wasn’t. I assumed he was 1-2 riders back and put my head down and road as hard as I could for as long as I could…two riders came by me at ~200-meters to go with Rick on their wheel. Rick looked cool and collected as he came by me and I knew then we were going to win…he is that fast ) Rick, according to my wife who was at the finish line, had a healthy lead as he crossed the line in first place.
Team finishing places: Rick 1st, Rob 7th, Randy F 13th, Matt 14th, Carlos 18th?, Randy V 19th, Steve 21st, Dave 24th, Brad 32nd
Two other team mates competed in the Cat 5’s …have not heard how this went but the results show Ken 23rd and John 27th.
Our next races will be at the Madera Stage Race on the 13-14th of March…
Rob