Have to Know Where the Finish Line Is

By John McKee

I will have a limited report for the 55s. I wasn't in the race but got some feedback from some riders.

There were 21 pre regs and 24 finishers. 2 pre regs couldn't make it including fellow writer Richard Pollock. As told in my last story about the 60s the 55s started at 7:35 am. UCC/JW Flooring had 5 riders in the mix. Bill Tippetts led the field up the climb. Bill is a great climber and easily led the pack by 100 meters. A hill top finish would of course be great for Bill but the top of the hill was only half way home. I don't know how the race played out after that but a pretty large group came in for the win. Ricky Shorts is usually known as a sprinter but him and his brother Al got over the hill in good shape. The only problem for Ricky was something really simple. He didn't pay attention to where the finish line was when he started. The officials set up was on the left as you would ride in. That's where the finish line was. Ricky was looking at a pop up on the right side about 40 meters after the real finish line as being where he thought the finish was. Oh well. Good ride by Ricky anyway. Karl Weber who I don't know at this time had an excellent ride for 3rd place. Great showing by the 55s at Bakersfield. Here is a complete list of finishers in order:

Szkalak

Shorts

Weber

Luedtke

Rodriguez

Guglielmelli

Huffman

Holland

Jones

Tippets

Marotta

Shorts

Pfister

Laird

Bernede

Horine

Moore

Hechanova

Miller

Hain

Anderson

Borer

Tokar

Gomez