Rick Kile’s Race Report
Golden State Race Series presented by Rio Strada
Saturday Criterium: Boy it’s nice not to have to travel 3 hours to a race venue, a 30 minute drive had us located in a nice venue off Hwy 50. It was a modern business park setting with wide roads and oddly shaped turns, temperatures a chilly ~50 degrees at 9am but perfect once racing started. We rolled out right on schedule with 45, 45+ racers. A pretty standard Criterium, with a couple of primes to keep the pace up; Paul Diaz from Colavita (3rd at Livermore) took both the primes and looked to be my primary antagonist. We had a couple of minor flyers, but nothing was going to stick on this wide open course. I positioned my self well on the back stretch opting for an inside final corner position since the road pinched down on the outside; better to have control of my own line, or so I thought. I rolled through the corner clean about 4th wheel, and started my sprint, where I then proceeded to pull my foot out of my pedal. I did not panic, re-clipped started my sprint again, over geared and off balance, I then pulled a wheelie. I finally got it together and made a run for the line; I salvaged a 5th place. There is something to be said for being near the front on that final corner. I was pretty frustrated and felt I had a better placing in my legs. I was really bummed that I more than likely let the nice custom signed overall winners jersey slip away. I promptly went to Bicycles Plus and bought a new pair of pedals; blame it on the equipment. :-0
Sunday for the Circuit Race, it was the same venue, stretched into a good course with quite a few more turns and a pretty strong wind in spots. The field was smaller, only about 30 guys in the field. We had two primes, I took one mainly to match Paul’s hard earned chase for a prime earlier, there were a couple other flyers that kept the pace reasonable; we did 6 or 7 laps in all. Going into the last lap we had two guys go off the front, we reeled them in a bit a couple times but backed off and ultimately waited too long. We were ripping down the back stretch getting closer to the break when Paul made the right move going into the final ‘chicane’ before the finish. That created an opening and I got on his wheel to thread the final two corners single file. We both started our sprint and caught the 2nd guy in the break and I nipped Paul at the line for 2nd. A guy from Truckee took the well deserved solo win. Since yesterday’s winner did not race, Paul and I ended up tied for first with 7 ‘points’ (the sum of both race places, him 4-3, me 5-2). Since I placed better in the second race, that was the tie breaker, and I won the overall and the cool jersey signed by George Hincapie and Levi Leipheimer. A pretty good outing given my mishap in the finish yesterday.
I hope to have good races next weekend for Folsom and Auburn, did I mention it’s nice to only drive 30 minutes to races?
Rick Kile
That’s funny I actually know Paul. Good job Rick!