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2007-07-10 12:07:48

West Chester Pa

July 10, 2007: Almost a repeat

Wow..how close...and yet how far. Details to follow!
I traveled up for my 2nd trip to quaint West Chester, PA for the Iron Hill Twilight crit. The sponsors were bigger, the fans were louder and I was as jacked up as always.

The pro racing started with the women around 6:15 pm. It was a small but stacked field. Aarons, Verducci Breakaway, Tibco and Cheerwine were there to represent their teams. The race started rather benign until a nice littly stack up on the back side of the course shredded the field. Ironically you would think free lap, but the field was so small that that was only a means to add absolute carnage to the race. The push from the pit was good, but most girls like favorites Laura Van Gilder and Sara Caravella had to pin it to catch the leader. That just detonated the field. So, the race immediately went from 30 racers to 12. Cat and mouse with no dominant team led to a field kick. Per4mance Training friend Laura Van Gilder with the tire width win

The mens race was getting all lathered up because the crowd was truly getting frothed up from Iron Hill Beer. The race started like all the other USA Crit races with a 250$ kicker preem. From then on...drag race. Most efforts came on the back side with the small hill adding a sting. Lots of solid teams present, but not big TEAM numbers. 3-4 of each team. Priority Health, AEG/Toshiba/Jetnetwork,Rite Aid, Nerac, Battley Harley Davidson etc.

Action was very spicy because of preems and no team to control. Eventually Trinidad and Tobago racer Emile Abraham of Priority Health snapped off a huge effort for a preem and drug Evan Fader of Battley with him. Teams gave them rope, but a short one. Eventually racers were launching bridge attacks, but nothing came to fruition with Battley and Priority Health patrolling. Soon the gap was 15 seconds and growing. Teams were looking around for others to chase, but attacking was more prevelant than a concerted chase. Eventually with 10 to go AEG and others got to the front and spent what remaing bullets they had left. 5 to to it was 13 seconds. 3 to go it was 16 seconds. You got it....effort, then shut down.

Emile and Evan (Yes I called him Dave Fuentes! Zoink, apologies Evan) worked off each other until the last lap, where one of the best sprinters in the country snapped off a big confidence building win. Emile Abraham and some demonic dude next to him

I was lucky and picked both  winners before the races started...although I wasnt reaching.

Kudos to West Chester and Iron Hill

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