Mormon Lake Road Race

The transition to road racing has officially started this fall. I was pretty done after Leadville but wanted to upgrade to 3's by the end of the year, so I decided to do some racing just for fun. The Mormon Lake road race is on a coarse just outside of Flagstaff. It consists of a circuit that I do for training every weekend so I thought it would be fun to do. Flagstaff cycling was putting it on, which was another big plus!!

We had a pretty large group, with more than 50 riders. I had a few strong teammates in the group though, so I knew we could keep a large group contained. The race started out chill with a few attacks that led to a couple dumb crashes, luckily I was able to avoid them! There was really only one decisive climb on the course which came towards the end of the 16 mile lap. It was short, but steep enough to get a gap. The problem was holding the gap, immediately after the climb there is a couple mile descent towards the Mormon Lake Lodge, which is much faster in a large group. On the first lap the pace was fast up the climb but the group still remained large with about 40 guys.

Heading into the second lap, I know I wanted to try to get a break away. As soon as the course turned onto Lake Mary road I attacked hard and was able to get away with two other guys. It was a rare calm winded day out on this stretch of road which made it difficult for us to stay away. We held off the group for a few miles but got caught towards the end of the lap.

With about thirty guys left in the group going into the third lap and little chance of a breakaway the team started working together to get ready for the sprint. Chuck, Derek, and Ken all went up front and took big pulls so I could just sit in which was awesome. We completely controlled the last lap. Ken and Chuck took a few big pulls before the climb and fell off but Derek stayed with me. He worked hard and put in a huge effort with about a kilometer to go. The sprint was on a slight climb which I liked, so with about 400 meters to go I went. I dodged a few riders and opened it up. I felt good and was able to come across the line first!

I was stoked with Flagstaff Cycling's performance. We really worked together and I am extremely appreciative to Chuck, Ken, and Derek who guided me to the win. This win gave me enough points to upgrade to 3's so there's nothing left to do but race a couple of time trials to finish off the year.