Rouge Roubaix

Last weekend, the team headed to Baton Rouge, Louisiana for Rouge Roubaix. With Nathan back in Florida with his child, Andre took over DS duties for the weekend. We drove up on Friday afternoon and pre-rode some of the course. We rode some of the final dirt road section and after seeing the decisive points, I was thinking we were going to win the race. I knew that there weren't any riders that could challenge us in the technical sections. Saturday wasn't all good though. Mid way through the dirt section, Ashley broke her bike on an uphill. That meant she would be racing on the spare bike. Not good.

Sunday morning came far too early, especially with daylight savings. After a big breakfast and a brief team meeting, the race was underway. The race for Christian and I did not start until the final 30 miles. That meant being patient. I'm usually not that good at being patient but in this case, I did alright. From the gun, Mat Stephens took off and immediately opened a gap. A few miles before the first dirt section, Bryan Fawley attacked and took several riders with him including Corey. They worked there way up to a 3 minute gap, but after the first feed zone, we had them in sight. We had 2 guys up the road and we were just sitting back and following wheels. Life was good. Going into the 2nd dirt section, we had a front group of around 25 and one major player wasn't present. We had dropped Carlos Vargas in the first dirt section and he was forced to chase. With a $100 hilltop prime in the 2nd dirt section, we sent Benji and Peter up the road. We were hoping they could stay off long enough to grab the prime and keep rolling into the final dirt section. The plan didn't work quite like that, with other people chasing hard, Christian and I took a free ride up and over the hill with Christian grabbing the money. After the second dirt section and the second feed zone, there was a small group of Christian, Peter, myself, Travis Burandt and some other guy hanging on. We had probably a minute on the chasers which included Benji. With the other 2 guys outnumbered, we were forced to rotate through to maintain a gap. After a few miles of this, we sat up and let the chase group catch us. Now it was a group of 13 which included Benji, Peter, Christian and myself. Life was still good.  

Sometime before the final dirt section, Matt Davis rolled off the front and held a gap of about 30 seconds. With the numbers in our favor, people were looking at us to chase it down. We weren't too worried about it with the decisive part of the race yet to come. Just for good measure, Peter launched off the front in pursuit of the solo rider off the front. Going into the final 4 mile dirt section, Matt had a gap of 45 seconds. With this section being by far the most technical, Christian and I took over and did work! catching and dropping Matt halfway through and putting about a minute into him by the time we were done with all the dirt roads. Now all that was left was Christian and I team time trialing the final 20ish miles to the finish for a 1-2 finish. After we were off the front, I was so worried about building a bigger gap and crossing the line hand in hand, I forgot to eat more food. With about 2k to go I lost Christian's wheel. Rookie mistake. Christian waited for a bit but eventually had to keep going so we wouldn't lose it all. I pounded some food and limped in for 2nd. Still a good minute ahead of 3rd, Matt Davis. After that is the cool part. Peter and Benji were in the chase group picking up the pieces. Fawley took the sprint for 4th, but Peter and Benji took 5th and 7th. That's 4 riders in the top 10 and 3 in the top 5. It doesn't get too much better than that. The whole team rode awesome and it was an example of team work at its best. Mat, Corey and Gonzo killed themselves at the front patrolling stuff for us all day and it paid off! We also got 13th, 15th and 19th I believe. 

For the guys, it was our first win of the year, and I am sure it will not be our last. We made this one count.






Also, in the girls race; Casey won her second straight race after winning Pace Bend a few weeks ago. Ashley had a good ride, taking 2nd on the spare bike. She such a BAMF, she has more fight than anyone I have ever met. I think the girls also got 4th and 5th. Overall, Metro VW dominated the weekend. To be honest, had we not dominated, it would have been a sub par day of racing. Huge thanks to Andre and Joe's friend Chris for the support during the race. Next up on the schedule is San Dimas and Redlands in California.