The year 2012 has seen big crowds at the criteriums in Southern California. Ontario #2 saw very big crowds. Many of the races were sold out including the 50+ at 100 and 45+ at 125. The 55/60+ categories saw about 60 riders come to the line. Sho Air/Rock N Road chose not to contest the race. Mark Hoffenberg was away on business until late Sat. and chose not to do an early start at Ontario. Nicolette and Schnepf were doing hll training for San Dimas while Pelky was mixing it up at Ontario in the Pro/1/2 race. 2nd week in a row for Pelky to do that. I guess he is getting too fast for the rest of us mere mortal 55/60+ racers. UC Cyclery saw a limited number of riders. Still if this wasn't a record number at Ontario it was close to it.
In 55+ Spy/Swami's had near a full squad. The other clubs looked a little depleted. In 60+ Paramount had been looking for a one, two, three finish but one of Paramount's riders with the initials HM showed up 10 minutes before the race and couldn't get in. So much for the podium sweep.
The temperature was around 55 at game time which was about 17 degrees warmer than Ontario #2 in 2011. That was really cold. The women cat 4 rode a clean race and had no crashes so the 55/60+ race was able to start on time. 7:35 am was the scheduled time and true to the schedule we were off! 40 minutes of criterium racing on the popular grand prix course in Ontario. Mike Birditt and Monty Pettus were the Ontario Series point leaders in 55+ and 60+ after the first race.
The pace for the first few laps was modest. No Sho Air to pick it up like at the last CBR race. After the first 5 miles the pace started to pick up. There were always some effort at breaks and Mike Birditt chose to sit in near the front and monitor things. Those that I saw in early breaks were Steve Bernede, Steve Hensler, and Dale Luedtke. Dale is starting to feel better and his form is coming on after a flat start for 2012.
No break got very far away. Mostly the normal flow of the race would get the breaks so close that they just gave up. Rick "The Lawman" Swanson was watching everything and if anything looked like it might be dangerous or the break started to get a little too far away, Rick would go to the front and lay down the law. Not on my this course, not today!
The primes no matter what they are for always bring out the testosterone in the racers. Prime prizes are very minimal at Ontario. Doesn't seem to matter though. Mike "I weigh my food" Birditt won some food/energy bars but wouldn't share after the race with this writer. What a bum.
The race came down to 7 laps to go and the Ontario Series points prime came up. This always gets the riders going. Everyone was following Mike Birditt around. Monty Pettus moved near the front and was shadowed by 2011 Ontario Series 60+ winner, David Lang. David says he isn't riding much these days but looks trimmer than last year and sure seems to be riding well. David came off of Monty to take the 60+ bonus points while Dale Luedtke took the 55+ points prime.
It was now down to serious business. Steve Bernede tried another break attempt and had 2 other riders join him. Steve and cohorts stayed away for several laps. Monty was a little worried with Steve being 60+ but I was counting on "The Lawman" to maintain law and order on the streets of Ontario and sure enough the wandering threesome was brought back to the peleton.
The bell lap came and everyone was in a big bee swarm. Spy/Swami's had tried to keep the pace up but didn't have the firepower to do it for all of the last laps. Mike Birditt was going to have to play off other wheels which he is a master at plus with his speed...well who wouldn't like to have his sprint. Unlike the prior Sunday Velo Allegro was going to line up for Ricky Shorts. Rod Mallory was heading up this task.
After the only right turn in the race Doug Knox tried one of his patented 1 k efforts for the finish line. Doug had a long ways to even get to the front but gave it a go for a short while. Doug likes to build up speed heading toward the front quite close to the edge of the peleton so riders can't see with him their peripheral vision. Once near the front he gets out of the saddle and jumps hard and rides clear. That's the plan anyway. Didn't work at Ontario.
H was marking Monty. I came up on his wheel between turn 5 and 6 out of 7 and decided to go around and mix in ahead of him. Mike Birditt was biding his time and playing off wheels. Dale Luedtke was showing some old spark and started moving on up. Nelson "Sit in" Alaan was also moving on up. If the pace was ever high all the time in the last few laps, Nelson would have a hard time getting to the front but we don't have the firepower in the teams to do that.
Hitting the last corner Mike Birditt was on Ricky Shorts and had a small number of riders still ahead. Ricky went left and Mike went right. Mike came upon a small group of riders that someone parted like the Red Sea in the "Ten Commandments" for Charlton Heston(Yikes-I think I used that already). Mike stayed in the saddle almost all the time churning away with those powerful legs. Mike was in the clear and looked back and saw Nelson Alaan to his right and thought he might have to get out of the saddle and kick it in but looked back one more time and saw that Nelson was maxed out and rolled across the line for the overall win and the 1st 55+ rider across the line. Nelson Alaan was 2nd in with Dale Luedtke powering in for 3rd place.
Monty Pettus used his awesome form to pass riders coming in and placed 4th overall and the 1st 60+ rider for the win in that category. Ricky Shorts rolled in next for 4th place in 55+. H came by me at 150 meters to go. My legs were feeling like cement and he was flying. H was the 5th finisher and the 2nd 60+ rider. I came in later for 3rd in 60+ followed closely by David Lang for 4th place.
There were no real close calls except for Ken Burns almost getting taken out by his teammate Demi. Demi came across Ken's wheel and Ken went 45 degrees but saved himself but with one lap to go he was out of it. It was a good fast race. The average speed was somewhere around 25.4...25.6 mph depending on which puter you get the info from. Good speed for this course and the seven turns.Complete results are below. There will be photos available soon at this site: http://public.fotki.com/quatre24/road--mtb-2012/ontario-2-2-26-12/. That's all for now folks! Train hard and race safe!
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| Finish of the 55/60+ race- Photo courtesy of Greg Castaneda |
| Dare To Race GP 2 (Rank 1.0) | ||||
| Masters 60+ | ||||
| Place | License | Name | Team | SoCal Points |
| 1 | 219074 | Leo Pettus | Paramount Racing | 14 |
| 2 | 315702 | Harold Schneider | Cycles Veloce/ Team Simple Green/Bike Religion | 11 |
| 3 | 180386 | John McKee | Paramount Racing | 10 |
| 4 | 107852 | David Lang | DARE | 9 |
| 5 | 195498 | Donald Kimper | UC Cyclery/JW Floors | 8 |
| 6 | 129293 | Michael Fleming | South Bay Wheelmen | 7 |
| 7 | 245777 | Steven Borer | UC Cyclery/JW Floors | 6 |
| 8 | 243425 | mark wisnosky | ACQUA AL 2/SDBC | 5 |
| 9 | 61278 | Mario Seri | Velo Club LaGrange | 4 |
| 10 | 61504 | Andrzej Fidelus | Ranchos Cycling Club | 3 |
| 11 | 45763 | Robert Paganini | Pasadena Athletic Assoc (PAA) | 2 |
| 12 | 50498 | Richard Rodriguez | Pacific Sunset Velo/Pac Sun Velo | 1 |
| 13 | 50406 | Michael Edwards | Velo Club LaGrange | 0 |
| 14 | 57726 | Ernest Hoffer | Velo Club LaGrange | 0 |
| 15 | 301363 | Mick Iwadare | South Bay Wheelmen | 0 |
| 16 | 203244 | cary alpert | South Bay Wheelmen | 0 |
| 17 | 126351 | Steve Bernede | Team Werks | 0 |
| Dare To Race GP 2 (Rank 1.0) | ||||
| Masters 55+ | ||||
| Place | License | Name | Team | SoCal Points |
| 1 | 47255 | Michael Birditt | Spy-Swami's Cycling Team | 14 |
| 2 | 64439 | Nelson Alaan | Cal-Pacific Export Packers / LV | 11 |
| 3 | 47262 | Dale Luedtke | Spy-Swami's Cycling Team | 10 |
| 4 | 52251 | Ricky Shorts | Velo Allegro | 9 |
| 5 | 15874 | Steve Hensler | UC Cyclery/JW Floors | 8 |
| 6 | 1254 | Mark Ainslie | 7 | |
| 7 | 52086 | cyril hunte | 6 | |
| 8 | 46255 | Alex Collins | UC Cyclery/JW Floors | 5 |
| 9 | 30596 | Wayne Rosenkrantz | Pinnaclife Racing Team | 4 |
| 10 | 36299 | Dan Valentin | Citrus Valley Velo | 3 |
| 11 | 204724 | Steve Cahill | Celo Pacific | 2 |
| 12 | 93812 | Donald Denegal | Velo Allegro | 1 |
| 13 | 107559 | rodney malloy | Velo Allegro | 0 |
| 14 | 45431 | Bruce Hartley | Pinnaclife Racing Team | 0 |
| 15 | 277180 | John Roest | Team CF-Club | 0 |
| 16 | 50765 | Richard Roberson | UC Cyclery/JW Floors | 0 |
| 17 | 104199 | Mark Parra | Team Redlands | 0 |
| 18 | 266002 | laszlo lukacs | 0 | |
| 19 | 202041 | Mark Planellas | Southern California Velo | 0 |
| 20 | 49110 | Rino Barbagiovanni | Santa Clarita Velo | 0 |
| 21 | 352540 | Scotty Bohlman | Jessup Auto Plaza p/b P.S. Cyclery | 0 |
| 22 | 222523 | Rick Carrera | Team Simple Green/Bike Religion | 0 |
| 23 | 155459 | Thomas Reilly | Santa Clarita Velo | 0 |
| 24 | 311649 | Rogellio Padilla | 0 | |
| 25 | 58799 | John Ward | 0 | |
| 26 | 174212 | brian carrico | PAA/REMAX | 0 |
| 27 | 25023 | Jeffrey Moreton | PAA/REMAX | 0 |
| 28 | 56643 | robert shupper | Pasadena Athletic Assoc (PAA) | 0 |
| 29 | 9271 | Pete Dern | Velo Club LaGrange | 0 |
| 30 | 66553 | John Sinz | OCW/Paramount Racing | 0 |
| 31 | 302695 | John LaGrandeur | OTR Racing | 0 |
| 32 | 271566 | Alex Gonzalez | Velo Allegro | 0 |
| 33 | 222764 | Thomas Buescher | South Bay Wheelmen | 0 |
| 34 | 95649 | Ken Burns | Southern California Velo | 0 |
| 35 | 178495 | Steve Diamond | Spy-Swami's Cycling Team | 0 |
| 36 | 45582 | Cleaveran Law | Cal-Pacific Export Packers / LV | 0 |
| 37 | 187428 | Michael Evans | 0 | |
| 38 | 167453 | bob estupinan | Citrus Valley Velo | 0 |
| 39 | 34753 | Rick Swanson | Spy-Swami's Cycling Team | 0 |
| 40 | 45552 | Douglas Knox | Time Factory Team | 0 |
| 41 | 148853 | Dale Raymond | Southern California Velo | 0 |
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