After a foggy morning the cloud cover broke and yielded exquisite riding conditions Saturday at the state road race championships in Willow Springs. A narrow, congested road and defensive fields made breaking away difficult, and, alas, the final stairstep climb did not put sprinters at the disadvantage I was expecting, resulting in some exciting if chaotic finishes.

Nearby Lemont’s most famous son, Christian Vande Velde (Garmin-Slipstream), dropped by in the morning. He could not be coaxed into racing

— even with a broken wrist, I suspect he could have picked up some coveted ICA Cup points —

but he did escort the juniors for a lap. They dropped him in the uphill sprint, won by Ryan O’Boyle in the 15-18 and Trevor Rolette in the 10-14, a sweep for the South Chicago Wheelmen.

Some of the most animated racing came in the P/1/2’s, which had a fair share of lolly-gagging but also a series of attacks on the second lap that eventually yielded a group of six, all of whom had teammates in the chase, helping pad their gap to more than a minute. After 40 cooperative miles, hostilities broke out on the final lap. With a few miles to go, Ryan Freund (ABD) attacked hard and created a dangerous 10-second gap. The remaining five caught him early in the climb, where further attacks ensued. On the final pitch, Rob White (Geargrinder) put in the final punch, breaking clear with an incredible jump, followed by Jeff Barnes (Iowa City Cycling) and Seth Meyer (XXX Racing-AthletiCo), the later of whom was the first Illinoisan and thus your new men’s state champion.

In the women’s P/1/2/3’s, a breakaway of four escaped from the starting line. Defending champion Kristen Meshberg (Team BH USA) flatted in the first few miles and took a wheel from her out-of-state teammate Anne Meyer, but she couldn’t get back on terms with Debbie Dust (PACT/DIsh Network), who time-trialed into the distance and into the championship jersey.

Gina Champion (Team Mack) lived up to her name and won the women’s 4’s race out of a lead pack of nine, and Pascale Petro (Project 5) wrapped up a successful year by winning the women’s 35+.

New squad Bloomington Cycling and Fitness made an impressive debut in the 3’s, where Chris Curran and Nick Ramirez, both of whom had impressive Superweeks as 4’s, found a good lane during the sprawling drag race and finished 1-2. Chicago’s Nate Iden (Burnham Racing) rounded out the podium.

I’ve remarked before how unusual it is to see a well-formed train in the lower categories. The Chicago Cuttin’ Crew is the one of only two teams I’ve seen do it with precision and success (Tower Racing is the other), and this is definitely a course where a good leadout is key. The boys in blue did it again Saturday in the 4’s, although when the caboose got derailed it was up to Jeff Perkins to seal the deal. Seal it he did, crossing the line just ahead of a hard-charging Chris Koster (XXX Racing-AthletiCo). (Perkins, shown above with Koster and James Cooper (Team MS Racing), noted beforehand that his road bike had gathered dust since last being raced in May.)

The day’s other breakaway came in the masters 1/2/3’s, where Christian Zauner (Verdirgris) came out on top of the 40+.  Finishing 4th to take the 30+ was Mike Heagney (Vision Quest).  In the earlier masters race, Gary Doering (Team Mack) outsprinted a tough 50+ field while masters national champion Thomas Weil (ABD) took the 60+.

The day’s closest race was in the 30+ 4/5’s, where video showed Jason Senffner (Bicycle Heaven) and Matt Samples (North Branch) crossing with an imperceptible margin. Officials gave the win to Senffner.

Crashes afflicted the day’s largest field, the 40+ 4/5’s, but David Schrauth (2CC) stayed clear of the mayhem and crossed the line first.

And how’s this for consistency: Kyle Selph (Tower Racing) raced two of the three Cat 5 heats and won them both. The 23-year-old has exactly four races on his palmarès

—

and four victories. Erik Wiebe (Team MS Racing) took the third heat, which Selph was unable to contest owing to USAC prohibitions against competing in two concurrent races.

Full results.

Race reports
Dave Bower (Half Acre Cycling; 4): “Avoid the dead opposum. Avoid the two crashes. Sprint hard. Cross finish line, body and bike intact.  Have two Old Styles with the team.”

Rob Curtis (Bicycle Heaven): “No one knows WTF is going on, and the finish line is quite a distance away.”

Debbie Dust (PACT/Dish Network; W/P/1/2/3): “I busted my ass out there to take the win today.”

Ryan Fay (XXX Racing-AthletiCo; 4): “By the time the last climb came those calves were too spent to be competitive.”

Joey Iuliano (Purdue; P/1/2): “The race was, at least in my mind, what racing a masters race would be like: angry, yet no one wants to do anything for more than a few seconds.”

Adam Leibman (ABD; 3): “Thoroughly and utterly destroyed, nearly as dead as the opossum I dodged each time up the hill.”

Kristen Meshberg (Team BH USA; W-P/1/2/3): “It was a gorgeous day and fortunately Anne and I like riding our bikes, so at least we got in some nice hard riding.”

Seth Meyer (XXX Racing-AthletiCo; P/1/2): “Everyone wanted to save it for the last lap, so we just sort of crossed our fingers and hoped the situation didn’t get too precarious.”

Brian Morrissey (XXX Racing-AthletiCo; 3): “I waited for fireworks to begin.  And waited.  And waited.”

Ian Murray (Turin; 5): “I tried to gap people FTW. Unfortunately, I was not strong enough to make that happen, and thus faded and let mad people pass me.”

Avi Neurohr (Chicago Cuttin’ Crew; 30+ 4/5, 4): “It’s not rocket science, but it’s one thing to see it on TV, another to pull it off.”

William Pankonin (XXX Racing-AthletiCo; 30+ 4/5): “Told a few racers that we should hit the gas. No one seemed interested.”

Julie Popper (Half Acre Cycling; W-4): “I should have thought like a racer and tried to solo a little to make space for my bad climbing, but it was more fun to ride in the group.”

Luke Seemann (XXX Racing-AthletiCo; 3): “I was too far back and got too bolloxed by the traffic—some of which was covering more distance left-to-right than forward progress—to unleash the final dig I’d been visualizing for the past month.”

Mike Shea (Spidermonkey Cycling; 4): “With around 300 meters remaining, Drew came around, then the winner, then the top 10, then friggin’ everyone else.”

Zach Thomas (Half Acre Cycling; 4): “I got myself into a decent position behind the Cuttin’ Crew train and started the hill trying to get through the traffic.”

Photos
Gavin Gould
Luke Seemann