Super Squadra

The 2009 race season has officially started with last weekend’s Alsatian Country Omnium.  This second year race was held in Castroville, a town right outside of San Antonio.  The race consisted of three separate events (time trial, criterium and road race) with each event being scored on a point system.  The higher the place, the more points you score and with whomever having the most points in the end would be the winner.

The time trial was Saturday morning and it was a 10 mile out and back course.  The wind was ripping from the south so the first 5 miles (which headed north) were very easy and the last 5 miles (which headed south) were very painful.  With having a time trial this early in the season it was a great indicator on how everyone’s fitness was and Super Squadra’s very own Dave Wenger didn’t disappoint.  Dave won the time trial event with a smoking fast time that gave him the lead going into the criterium later Saturday afternoon.

The criterium was held in a city park on a very fast and tight course.  For 60 minutes racers tried to attack the field and gain an advantage but the pace was too high as the race ended up in a field sprint.  Phil positioned Dave as close to the front as he could and Dave used this good positioning to grab a top 5 finish.  With this result Dave ended the day in the lead and set up a day of defending for the rest of us.

On sunday morning the teams goal was to protect Dave and the overall lead that he had worked so hard to get on Saturday.  Phil and I got into a couple of early moves before the counter break went up the road which included our johnny on the spot, Ian Dille.  Ian was off in the break for most of the first half of the race until they were slowly brought back.  The wind was once again a factor and with a huge chunk of the course having a fierce cross-wind the field was getting destroyed every lap.  After a brief delay from the officials scolding the riders for abusing the yellow-line rule, the racing picked back up and a three man break established a gap.  Bryan Fawley (Park Place/Lexus), Russ Walker (Tx Tough) and Justin Wallace (Moritz) were working well together and forced us to start chasing with around 15 miles left in the race.  Ian, Patrick McCarty (OUCH) and I started rotating at the front and kept Dave sheltered from the wind as everyone else lined up behind him in the gutter fighting for postition.  The three of us shared the work and we slowly pulled back the breakaway with around five miles left in the race.  Coming into the finish, Dave did his best to follow the right wheels and ended up with another top 5 finish on a very hard long uphill drag.  Unfortunately for us, Kevin Kremke (Bike Barn) exploded out of the field in the final sprint, winning the race and capturing the overall win as well.  Dave did finish up 2nd overall for the weekend though and gave Super Squadra a great start heading into the 2009 season.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 10th, 2009 at 10:23 pm and is filed under General Information. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.