This is a loooong Report
Your Evo team (Stewart, Adam C., Will, Vic the Brick, my brother Mark and myself) is now the proud holders of the Kuhn Cup.
We went out early Saturday morning to compete against two other teams for the coveted trophy and came away victorious. The idea of starting out at 5 am during a natural disaster did not dissuade our determined group of riders. We arrived at the designated parking area to find no registration, no officials, no promoter, nothing other than the misguided souls how signed up for the event. Finally, the promoter arrived and informed all the teams that the officials were not on site because of some scheduling confusion on their part but there would be marshals on the course for the point’s race. We began to contemplate the legitimacy of the event and discussed the implications if something were to go wrong. Undeterred, we suited up for the first leg, a 20k Team time trial.
We had to ride over 20k to the start and we were a little behind so we had to motor up river to the start. We were riding past flooded fields and through all sorts of scattered debris on the way to the start, not to mention a stiff head wind and all the rain. As the cooling towers of Three Mile Island appeared, I knew we were nearing the start of the TT but we were short two of our men who fell of the pace set by our hammerhead, Stu. The teams lined up for the start and headed off in two minute intervals and as the timer announced 30 seconds to go, Adam and Will appeared up the road.
We started off and immediate got our speed up to 30mph as everyone pulled through. We lost one man within the first mile after we hit the early rollers. These were fairly big humps but not steep. It was very difficult to pull into one and get back on as the speed stayed constant. It was pretty obvious that Mark and Stu were going to do the majority of the work for this leg and the rest of us would just pull through quickly to give them a breather. We started to pass some stragglers and before long, we had our two minute team in sight. We lost one more man at the halfway mark, so we needed to keep everyone together in order to finish. Since we had no idea of how far we had left, we concentrated on reeling in our prey. I saw a road sign that had gotten blown over with the mileage back to Marietta listed as 5 miles and knew we had a few clicks to go. Within a few minutes, I saw a traffic signal and it took me a second or two to realize the finish was coming. I yelled out to everyone and wound up the sprint into the finish. We rolled back to the cars to change and get our finishing time. We finished in 30:08 and had a lead of 1’30” over 2nd place and almost 3’00 over 3rd. It was a good lead but the next event would allow the others to catch up.
The format called for an afternoon point’s race for time bonuses and the teams would be divided into two fields but since there were a total of 17 riders, they doubled the bonuses on each lap and kept the groups together. The race was held on a 2.5 mile, four corner course and we rode for a total of ten laps (roughly 40k). The third straight had a nice hill toward the end that began steep and rose up to the last turn. This section also led you into a strong 15-20mph head wind. The finish line was atop a nice little rise about ½ mile from the last turn. We started out fast and a guy from 2nd place team went for the early break. I jumped to him and sat while the rest of the field fell in behind us as we approached the first time up the hill. My brother attacked going up the hill, forcing the other teams to chase and the rest of the Evo guys to follow wheels. He was clear, going into the finish with just one guy trying to bridge alone. I jumped early, passed the chaser to take 2nd and increased our overall lead. The field came back together at the start of the next lap and going into the hill again, 2nd place team attacked with two guys. Mark closed the gap to them and those three started to pull away for the field. With no time bonuses left, only the 3rd place team had reason to chase. They were losing guys quickly due to the wind and the hill. At the halfway point, we had bonuses to 5th place so we had Stu lead us out and Vic and I would go for the sprint. One guy came from the right early so I picked it up and lead out Vic who took 4th. More time to us but I was unsure how Mark was doing up the road. As it turned out, he took 1st in all but three laps as he went on to drop the two guys and soloed for the last three laps. Vic grabbed 3rd on the last lap for more time and we ended up increasing our overall lead.
The ride home was long but I learned a lot about my teammates.
First thing is that wet racers stink BAD but not as bad as Vic’s pre-race meal of yogurt and oatmeal. Will has some great ideas regarding business opportunities in Canadian agriculture as well as providing entertainment services. And lastly, Adam can sleep through any amount of noise.
Good Job Team
Next job is to DEFEND THE CUP
steve