= Mike (the Revenger)
Yes we
are back once again race fans for another stage of the 2008 Tour de Schwinn
which is put on by Kokomo Cycling and Fitness for the BreakAway Bicycle Club.
This week we have the stage known as Mike' Revenge, usually a very tough stage
however like last year the big teeth have been pulled from this stage. That is
to say that the stage has far less climbing in it then it did in 2004-2006. In
fact this stage is more down hill than it is uphill. It is still a longer stage
then most rides being 7.4 miles. It is the exact same course as in the 2007
Tour, the average real time was 21:45 with a speed of about 20.5 mph. Before
2007 however the average times were above 30 minutes with speeds down in the
13-14 mph range. So as you can see this is a much faster version versus the
earlier tours. There is still a good climb in this stage, a .3 mile at 8% which
comes in the first half of the ride after that it is all down hill. So on
with the race... no, not yet. First we should look at what happened last week
during the Hill Climb stage. The race saw Tom McMahan of the Flying Squirrels
get his first stage win. The Majestic Moose won the stage in the team event
however the American Flyers stay 1st in the team GC. Ron Moore of the Flyers
went into the race as the GC leader but was unable to stay there as he dropped
down to 5th overall. Replacing Ron is his team Captain Clark Griffin. Charlie
Skoog of the Time Lords climbed his way into second and Francis Manfred fell to
3rd. Markus Naegeli vaulted himself into 4th (Ron M in 5th as stated above) and
Ryan Hulce who was in 4th drops off the mountain into 20th. Ryan suffered a
crash last week along with Kevin Wisher, Ryan was able to finish the ride
however Kevin was forced to abandon the tour. Neither man was hurt badly during
the crash according to team doctors. Kevin had already been struggling in the
tour this year and it looks like he just decided it was not in his best interest
to continue. We expect to see Ryan at the start of this next race and will
continue to report that until we hear otherwise. We wish Kevin the best for the
rest of his 2008 season. So with the GC mixed up one more time there is still no
easily picked winner for this years tour. I am sure however that we will receive
predictions from one or both of the Observers out there (The Observer of the
Tour and/or The Observer of All). Looking over the field one has to wonder can
Clark take it, or will Charlie or how about this being Francis's year. With two
races yet to come I think its still to close to call.
One interesting note
this year is the number of trivia questions appearing on the BABC message board,
we have had questions about who has been in the TdS every year, who has been in
the top 10 every year they have ridden (at least 3 years) and who has never been
in the top 10 (with at least 3 years in the tour). SuperMan proved he was, if
not super strong, he was at least super
smart by answering both those last questions correctly (depending on how one
reads the questions, there seems to be some grey area there). Other interesting
questions asked where : who were the tallest, oldest and youngest TdS
contestants(3 different people there); and how many individuals have ridden in
the Tours? If you have any interest in this go to the web page for all the answers if you like. And in case
you are wondering how anyone would know any of this, most of the information is
on the TdS site, you just have to spend some time going over page after page and
collect it. Or better yet I had a chance to make up a Tour de Schwinn
fact page , where I have gathered and listed several
facts/ trivia about the five years of the Tour de Schwinn .
Naturally things are
not done yet this year so other items will be added later or if anyone has any
thing they would like to know, I will do my best to include that information. Ok enough of that for now back to the event at hand.
That would be Mike's Revenge (the stage), with the riders already having been
given the start we join the race in progress..
So far it looks like this
stage the racers have decided to break up into three groups, we have the escape
group involving: Tom "Capt. Ironlegs" Linn(AmF), Stan "the Man" Shuey
(MM), Todd Brandenburg(BRW), Mitch Reeves(MM), Walt Kosiak(TL), Jeff Bell
(TL) and Steven Sehr(FS) . They have a bit of a lead over the chase group of Shawn Leonard
(MM), Larry Barnhart(KCF), Mark Bettinger(FS), and Charlie Skoog(TL). This group is off the front
of the main peleton and chasing hard but I do not think that they will catch the
escapees today. Further back (but not that far) is the main group who
include Francis Manfred(BRW), MissT.Rider(KCF) and Rick Weaver(KCF) among others.
The escape group has gotten over the main climb of today, a .3 miler at 8%
which is also the last climb today and that means its all down hill from here
folks. It also means they have about 4.5 miles to go. And as I was falling
asleep it seems that Tom Linn has pulled off an escape of his own. Tom seems to
be the next attack from the American Flyers this year as he timed things
perfectly to get away from the lead group. So with that jump Tom has started his
descent with a big gap with will be hard for anyone to make up on this course
today. Kudos Tom!!! Have to say the the AmF team has brought an excellent team
here this year and they have executed things well.
We expect it to be a very
fast finish today so we have gotten all the high tech, high speed cameras set up
at the finish line to capture all the action. Hoping of course that there will
be no crashes as the riders finish the race but filming it just in case!!! Mitch
Reeves and Stan Shuey of the Majestic Moose team have taken up the chase
of Tom. Jeff Bell, and Walt Kosiak (Time Lords) have also taken up the
chase however they are just a bit behind the Moose duo. If the 4 can work
together they stand a chance of catching Tom. The Time Lord pair and
the Moose duo do not seem willing to work together at all, there has been a bit
of rivalry between these two teams over the years. And there seems to be
some words between the squads as they cruise on down the road. OH that was not a
nice gesture. And with that Mitch jumps away from the other 3, Stan tries
to go with but can't match the speed. Jeff and Walt are ramping up the
speed now. Mitch continues to hammer away trying to bridge the gap to Tom Linn.
Back in the main group it looks like a few of our top riders are still feeling
the effects of the "PELETON FLU" going around this year. Some noteables not
having a good day (seemingly) are Ron Moore, Clark Griffin, Andrew Maibaum,
Larry Barnhart and Roxane Burrous. All are seem to be struggling just a bit.
Tom Linn looks to have done it here today, he has less than a mile to the finish and he only has Mitch to be concerned with but still has a good lead over him. This was a well planned attack launched earlier in the stage as the lead group was on the big climb of the day. Tom obviously was told by his team today to stay with the front group and to take the chance on an escape if he could. He has done it in style, this will be his first individual stage win for this 4 year veteran. This should also help his team retain its lead in the GC. Tom is now coming to the line ... 12:45 is his time. He certainly has gone all out, meanwhile the main peleton does not seem to have much sense of urgency to it today, they seem to be willing to let some of the lower ranked riders have their day in the sun. Seemingly content to battle out the Tour win in the Epilogue next week. Mitch seems concerned, for he has really been putting a lot into things today and so has Stan, Walt and Jeff. Mitch has come to the finish 17 seconds behind Tom for a time of 13:02. Wow these guys are going fast today. These two look like they have picked up at least a minute over the chase group of Stan, Jeff and Walt. The question is however where are your GC guys? Am not sure at this point but they are not where they want to be, which would be already done with this stage. Third place on the stage goes to Stan, so the Moose get 2nd and 3rd on the stage today . 4th and 5th go to the Time Lords as Walt then Jeff cross the line. So the top five are in and it could change things in the GC today. We continue to get reports that Clark is loosing chunks of time today along with team mate Ron Moore. And it is a good thing that the Time Lords had two high placing riders today for Charlie and Andrew also seem to be suffering on this stage. Ok this is really getting very confusing here today. Expect BIG CHANGES in the GC this week. I think Mitch is going to be rocketed up near the top with Jeff Bell tagging along for the ride.
This is Mike saying ... I am out! See you next week, and remember that nothing will be posted about the last stage or the final results until after the Club Meeting on Monday night (after the race is done). We will be presenting the results and awards at the Club meeting so if you want to know, come to the meeting.
As for this week .. go check the results page .