Teammate Brandon Trafton would be my only teammate for the day. At the San Rafael Twilight the night before he soloed for 25% of the race and still had enough energy to lead out and send teammate Dana Williams into the final straight for the sprint finish. He's flying, I was pretty stoked. The race started fast with a first lap prime and immediately after Trafton is off the front with Johnathan Teeter (Marc-Pro Strava). Teeter just recently finished second place at the NRC Cascade Cycling Classic Time Trial and is the race favorite for the day.
The peloton chased hard after them for forty-five minutes, notably the entire Predator Cycling team, fresh from their win over crit-powerhouse UHC at Pairie State Cycling series, and Max Jenkins (Kenda Pro Cycling - 5-Hour Energy).
Justin Rossi (Marc-Pro/Strava) and I went ultimate passive aggressive blocking mode, clogging up lines in the turns and pretending to pull while Trafton and Teeter rode super humanly and maintained their thirty-five second lead.
Eventually the chase cracked and Rossi and I made the bridge up to Trafton and Teeter. All four of us traded pulls working together (photo credit: Steve Ellsworth), maybe only thirty seconds from lapping the field, until about four laps to go when Rossi and Teeter started to light things up and trade attacks, not wanting it to come down to a sprint.
We rode really well during this time, going all out to match Teeter's and Rossi's accelerations knowing that if we gave either of them any space they would just time trial away from us.
Coming into the last lap Rossi launched an attack that I chased. It gapped us pretty far from Teeter and Trafton. I sat behind Rossi, waiting for sprint distance to the finish line or for Trafton to catch up so I could lead him out, whichever came first. Trafton opted to play it safe and sit on Teeter rather than risk leading out Teeter in his chase up to me, which was a tremendous sacrifice on his part and ultimately gave me the win.
I had been cornering really well all day, so with the final corner in sight I jumped as hard as I could into it and came out with a decent gap that I carried to the finish line for the win. Trafton did the same thing behind me and came in for third.
Quick final note: Reno was incredibly hot and incredibly dry. Most of the race I had globs of dry spit accumulating on my lips and my throat being torn to bits from sucking down mouthfuls of dry air. I've had to take people's word that OSMO is the best drink mix for endurance athletes because I know absolutely nothing about life sciences, but today was the first time I was able to physically feel just how powerful this drink mix is. I am speechless as to how much better and how much easier the pedal strokes came after each drink of it.
