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2007-10-01 07:10:35

Vegas Baby!

USA Crits Finals at Mandalay Bay

Zoinks. Man that was a crazy week in Lost Wages. The USA Crit Finals had the final nail adminstered with the race held during Interbike.

Interbike is kind of a crazy melting pot of industry folk/bike racers/bike enthusiasts and overall general mayhem. I got to meet alot of folks that I would have never met before or had the opportunity to.

Here is a link to some of the shenanigans....before you read on

The week started off with me hosting the Interview session in the "bubble" of the media center in Interbike. I interviewed dignitaries of the USA Crit series, Umbrella girls and others involved in the series.

The week was one of little sleep. Strangely my body has always been good at time zone travel but this time I was on PST at nite and EST in the am....and that hosed my rhythm. 2am to bed 7am to wake. 

The day of the race came and the momentum was building towards a truly wild nite. Rock Racing brought their entire entourage along side them is all the Industry folks in a lather.

The race started with the women. Solid group including Cheerwine and Aarons along with Rochelle Gilmore and a spattering of heat from other teams. Essentially it was gas on the throddle with Cheerwine coming to the front with Laura Van Gilder riding 4th wheel and Gilmore fighting for hers. 4 to go and Cheewine had control. 1 to go and Cheerwine still holding off. With 150  meters to go, LVG was dumped off with Gilmore on the gallop. LVG had enough to hold off Gilmore with nothing to spare.

The industry cup was wild!!! You had the likes of Mario Cippollini, Steve Bauer, Tilford and some serious other heat giving it a rip in the "fun" race? Uh, nope. You put on a kit and a number we gonna have a race!!!! It was. The first 10 laps shelled half and the rest everyone was hanging on for dear life!! With one to go, Cippo was dragged down in a frackas, along with some others while Kenny Williams soloed to victory. Felt like a 1/2 category race for sure!

The final race pitted the current overall leader in Frank Travieso of AEG and other notables together for one last blast. The race started with a 250$ prime and never relented. Early series leader Mark Hekman was saddle with surgery so he was Abercrombie Cheerleader. Slipstream started the festivities with a move with CFred of AEG but they weren't given much rope. Lots of shuffling...but no one could shake. There were rumors that Rock Racing was going to throw out a monster gambler...but I wasn't willing to give the total details until we started under 10 laps to go. 

The atmosphere was loud and carnival like as we headed towards 10 to go. Undertones of a huge gambler had race radio's crackling from team managers. Kelly Benefit Strategies continued late season form with a tremendous show on the front, having 6 guys control speed and tempo. With 5 to go  KBS faltered only to gain control again. The desired intent of the big gambler prime was to really shake the tree. It was working, but KBS was not going to relent. With 3 to go KBS stood to benefit from the 5 THOUSAND dollar gambler prime...as they had the numbers on the front. Go for the Prime and lose the race...go for the prime and win the race (never a likely scenario) or save it? Well, Martin Gilbert of KBS pinned it with 1.5 to go and held of Client Keith Norris of AEG. He then had a sizeable gap that only a few could close to. Dominguez waited only briefly, realizing the speed Gilbert was carrying he went across. Gilbert drug him for another 100 meters and the Ivan jumped and soloed. Time enough for this

And this at the start?! huh? Thanks to steephill.tv for this shot and video someone passed on to me! Pure Vegas Video of it

So...all in all it was an amazing season fo USA Crits. I am tired as 40 hells right  now...but certainly worth time and effort.
Kudos to Swagger for somehow pulling off a very stress filled event. I look forward to many more!!!

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