My job for this race was to do some work patrolling the front early, maybe get in some breaks, and then rest and help set up Will at the end. It didn't exactly work out that way, but that's racing. Glen from Cyclesport attempted to repeat the tactic that got him second place last year, a stupid-early solo attack. Then in the second half of the first lap, the field let one guy just kind of roll off the front, so I jumped and bridged up to him, intending to spark a chase to catch Glen in the process. When I looked back, I saw that I had brought four other guys with me. When we caught Glen, the break was up to seven, with two Cyclesport riders, one Airborne, and three riders from other small teams.
At first the break didn't work well together at all. Since there were two Cyclesport riders, I was a little cautious about doing too much, and the Airborne guy just plain refused to do anything closely related to work. Glen was the first to be dropped, and then since the team representation was equal, I went to work. Over the next few laps, the break was steadily reduced to the point where with two to go there was just myself, the Airborne guy who had just recently started doing half hearted pulls, and another guy who as it turns out is friends with Indiana Jim. On the second to last time up the hill, a little over a lap to go, the Airborne rider dropped his chain, so it was just two of us for the last lap. It was unfortunate for the Airborne rider to lose places due to a mechanical, but he had done by far the least amount of work in the break, so maybe it was justice of a sort. Throughout the last lap I felt myself consistently getting weaker, but I tried to help as much as I could, because I knew the Airborne guy couldn’t be that far behind, and we were actually within sight of a small chase group for the last few miles. Right at the bottom of the hill going up to the finish the guy I was with accelerated, and that was it for me. It turned out that the chase group contained not one but two Airbornes, so it was good that I was able to grit it out and finish ahead of them. It’s too bad that I was so close but couldn’t pull out a win, but with my 2nd place, Will’s 7th and Rob’s 9th, I would say that it was a pretty successful day for Savage Hill.
