The Iowa games road race took place yesterday in Boone. It was a 26 mile race, couple Des Moines river crossings, which made for a couple good climbs. Myself (Ben Acree), Travis Jass and Keaton Williams made the trip down to have a go for Iowa gold. Turned out to be a better than expected day weather-wise. Not too hot like the previous day, but it was humid. We rolled out of Boone to head north on the course and we were treated to some brand new asphalt. Nice and smooth. The pace was not all that fast to start out with. There was a slight east wind, which made for a slight side wind, nothing too bad. The pace was around 19 mph to start out with. I moved up front to try to pick up the pace a little and was sucessfull only for a short while. Travis then came up and offered to stretch the pack out and then quickly brought the pace up to about 25. After about 8 miles, we headed toward the first Des Moines river crossing. The downhill is pretty steep on this one, I definately wanted to be up front on this to avoid be taking down at 45-50 mph. Topped out at 48.5 mph. Saw some other rider's bikes wobbling almost outta control. Well, with most downhills, gotta do the work and go up and this was no exception. A handful of junior riders from the Des Moines area were in the pack and quickly went to the front and really hammered the hill. Nice to see Keaton, who is a 16 year old FD senior high student and first time road racer, holding his own very well on the hill. Travis, as usual motored past me and up thru the field to goto the front of the pack. Myslef, I lost contact with the pack just at the top of the hill to find myslef in the tortuous predicament of being just out of reach of the pack and having to hammer it to stay with them, but not having enough strength to catch em. Fortuantely, hooked on with two other riders to work with and after several miles of chasing, caught back on. Several miles later, and with about 5 miles to go, rode next to Keaton for little while, offered the advice of trying to stay on Travis' wheel for the final hill. If he would be able to do this, he would fare very well. As the pack rolled along, the pace picked up a bit as the final miles rolled beneath us. As we approached the final Des Moines river crossing, moved down the hill quickly as a collective pack and then preceeded to start the final climb, which became a little hectic with riders moving up the hill very quickly and others seemingly rolling backwards. Travis again, put it in overdrive, motored on up the hill. Wasn't able to see Keaton on the last hill. The pack got really strung out by the top and pretty much stayed that way the final mile and half to the finish. Travis was in a separate smaller group of four chasing a lone rider up front. Travis was able to the beat out his fellow chasers to take second overall and iowa gold in the 30-39 age group. Just as we crossed the finish line, the wind really picked up and came at us sideways along with a torrential downpour. Below is pic of Travis collecting his gold bling to add to the nice collection he's already got going. Yes, that is the FD YMCA indoor tri shirt he's wearing. Reminder, Travis and his wife won the relay in last year's innagural event.
Keaton did very well for his first road race, ended up 5th in his age group, which consisted of already seasoned junior racers from Des Moines. Pic below is of Keaton waiting for final results of the junior category. He is the tall guy, right side wearing the red Fort Dodge Trisport shirt (available at Brown's Shoe Fit).
I ended up taking a silver in the 30-39 age group. Eric Knox had a prior comittment and could not make the race. Otherwise, I have no doubt he would have placed just before or after Travis making it a clean sweep of gold, silver and bronze for Fort Dodge in the our age category.
No comments:
Post a Comment