Henleyville Road Race Report from Hussien S.

Henleyville RR was super fun. I had a great time with Nick and Zony, the racing was good and hard and it was awesome seeing Zony and Nick both get fantastic results. I’m pasting below for folks’ reading entertainment Zony’s race report from the KaiVelo Slack channel (our tradition is whoever gets the best result writes the report).

The 35+ chose to race with the pro/1/2 so they combined our field with the 4s. A few minor flyers by the 4s the first lap, but nothing looked like it was going to stick.

I put in a couple of digs to see how people would respond, and was quickly chased down by the 50+ each time.

As we came through for the final lap, Hussein and I huddled and agreed the field would likely stay together, so we’d just cover any attacks. For the finish, if no one was driving it, the plan was that Hussein would stretch things out so that things didn’t clump up and I’d be able to navigate through the field. We also figured they might be marking me, so a variation was that Hussein might be able to sneak away.

Rick Lawton from Thirsty Bear started animating and drew the guy from Chico out with him as we approached the feed zone. I let the guy from Davis chase until he started to fade and then came around him. We wound up shedding him at this point.

Rick took a flyer and Hussein quickly marked him heavily. Rick went again and Hussein latched on. I waited for Chico to go, and then sat on him as he bridged us up. Hussein waved me through, and Rick and Chico started working to try to pull back a couple of solo 4s that had gone up the road. With a teammate back, I had the luxury of just sitting on them and they had to rotate in front of me.

Shortly thereafter we saw Hussein and a few of the 4s starting to bridge back. Chico put in a dig as we were closing in on a field in front of us. Not wanting him to get through the traffic, I jumped up to him, and then Rick powered through. We dropped Chico, but he came back. We would eventually drop him for good after the turn to the start/finish road.

For the last few miles, I’d pull through short and easy while Rick did most of the work. Hussein had warned me beforehand that the finish was a long way from the last turn, so I made sure to stay behind Rick, and the last half mile turned into cat and mouse. I slowed down and left a lot of space as Rick tried to get me to come around. He jumped early, but then sat up before going again. When I saw the 200 m to go sign I punched it, and immediately was rewarded with leg cramps. Fortunately they were manageable and I got the jump on Rick.

Great teamwork and two on the podium!

Race Report from Hussein S.