Dateline Walburg

Here’s a recap of MVC @ the Walburg Classic. First, to no one’s surprise who’s ever raced at Walburg, the predicted nice weather was a bad report. It was wet, and a little windy, and for extra fun, muddy. In other words, it was another Walburg Classic. Before we get to Jamey’s Cat 3 race report, here’s what we know about the other 4 races with MVC personnel. Well, to be accurate, what we know about Hammer and the 4s and that we still don’t know anything... except that the race is over.

Team Hotel San Jose hammered the P 1 field to set Josh Carter up for the win. Brownie fought valiantly as the only MVC-ite in that field, but finished well back of Carter. Nevertheless, he deserves our praise for taking on that challenge.

Nokki and Kolb tell us that the old(er) 4/5s have learned to race as teams. Nokki made the lead group but got guttered and slipped back to Tim in the 2nd group. Tim paced him back to the lead, but the teams in the lead used the weather and roads and split things up again. At that point, Nokki and Tim decided to save themselves for Pace Bend. Best of luck tomorrow boyz!

Once again, MVC made it’s presence known in the 40+ field. Seven started – Adams, the Patrick Burkes, Davidson, Powers, Price and Weber and 4 finished in the top 7! Bling Burke and road team coordinator Oz Weber made a 5 man break that also included OKC Velo’s Peter Erdoes and Lance Armstrong’;s regular ATX training buddy, John Korioth. Sensing that Korioth was the strongest in the group, Oz launched a late race attack to force Korioth to chase... and it worked but Koroioth was still able to hold off Bling and take the win. Bling was 2nd and Weber took 5th while Powers and Adams lead in the field taking 6th and 7th.

Congrats to all the race podiums and thanks to Team Brain and Spine for another classic Walburg Classic.

Now, here’s Jamey’s inside Cat 3 report:

“Shane [Ed. Note - that would be Shane “Sammy”] Haga was in a Cat 3 Walburg break for 45 miles and looking strong with a 2 minute gap and, at least at the start of the break, 8 guys to work ... Guys popped until only 4 were left including Shane.

Epic rain, enough wind to make it hard, and mud ... Excellent!

Last lap, chase of 5 went with 8 miles to go and we [ed. - “we” is Jamey and Steve Borski; Trevor had been caught up in a crash by then] didn't think it would stick ... It did ... but unfortunately Shane fell out with 5 miles to go in a 72 mi race. He said he did too much work and then they used him later on. I gave Shane a Gu and told him to regroup but he was shot.

Borski and I had been at front disrupting the chase in a good way. The remaining 3 from original break stayed off the front and damned if a 4 man the chase break didn't stick too. Borski and I were up front and trying to help a chase but guys must have been tired as we could never get it going.

I attacked with 2 mi to go but could not hold it as they chased me down pretty quickly and it was clearly a suicide mission ... Borski countered which was awesome but they did the same to him

Sprinting for 8th as we hit the finish hill and I had great position ... But I unclipped for 5 seconds after taking evasive action from a guy's bars next to me .... Lost 15 or so places ... and ended up having to repass them to regain original position and could not make it all up. Missed 8th by about amount of unclip. Not that 8th is great but it does have upgrade points with it ...

Borski and Shane soft-pedaled in but both raced great.

Borski rode like a champ doing textbook blocking at the front for all 3 laps! Tucson did him good!

Only 40 out of 80 finished, I think... Our only tactical mistake was not getting into that late chase break ... But we didn't think it would stick and we were still blocking as Shane was still up the road so did not want to invite a chase.

Looked like we had finished Paris Roubaix with the mud and wet from the rain!

Trevor had bad luck as a guy wrecked him on lap 2 on a right turn in the rain which sux. [Ed. Note - Trevor wasn’t hurt and his bike was fine too; but several bikes became entangled and by the time everyone unraveled the mess, there was no chance of chasing back on.]

We will try again tomorrow.

Jamey Munroe”