By Michael Birditt

The Callville Bay Stage race is always a special date on the stage racers calendar. As more race reports come in from our teams you will hear this year was "special" due to record breaking weather.

Friday: ITT / Prolog, a hill climb as most riders forego TT bikes and just use their normal road bike. Once I saw this I took off the clip-ons and followed most and rode my road bike. Pretty straight forward, go up a mostly steady 3-4% climb for about 2.5 miles, hit a 6-7% kicker the last .5 mile and drop to the finish about 4-500 meters away.
Warren Wicks had the pleasure of being #1 for 55+. I was 3rd. Gary Shuey and Kim Bleth later. Warren and I were on our way back down when we saw Gary and Kim coming up. Gary was pulling time back on Kenny Fuller who was going to be Swami's biggest GC threat. 

End result Gary won the ITT and was in 1st place overall with Kenny 2nd and Robert Wilcox (UCC) 3rd.

Saturday: 57 mile "rolling" (LOL) RR.
Ok so I'm writing this and I will take liberties with the course
description. Rolling is NOT what a sprinter would call those
mountains. No matter, we woke to cold, wind, and a steady rain. We all
knew the job was to keep Gary close to Kenny and Robert. One challenge
was we were racing with the 45+ and that field was stacked with talent
that was not going to allow a nice slow ride. They did not disappoint.
It was game on from the start. I understand we popped people right
from the get go. I only made it over the first climb and then could
not hold on. Kim quickly followed. Warren was able to stay up there
and was a big help to Gary later at the finish. I rode the next 50
miles soaked and with numb hands and feet. It was bad to the point
that I could not get food out of my jersey and almost dropped water
bottles numerous times. There were 2 turn around points and each time
as we passed I could see Gary sitting in protecting that GC. When they
came to the finish Warren led Gary out and Gary was right on Kenny.
Kenny won, Gary was second with a 17 second GC lead. Robert Wilcox

of UCC was 19 seconds down after the second stage. One stage to go.

Sunday: 40 minute Crit. Woke up to rain and record cold. Our 7am start
time did not help. Wet, cold course (34 degs at start) but at least
no wind !! Not too many guys showed up for this from either field,
45's or 55's. As I rode around taking "warm up" laps I really
questioned myself. But we had the GC lead and would work to protect
it. Gary was drilled the previous night that all he had to do was
stick with Kenny and finish. We all would do what we could to help. We
figured that the pace would be dictated by the 45's and it was right
from the gun we were popping people. Only 16 started in the 55's and 7
did not make it to the finish. Average speed was posted as 29.4 mph. At 6 laps
to go I could tell nothing was going to stay away and it would end in
a field sprint. Got up with Gary and made sure he stayed calm. He was
looking pretty relaxed. Kenny took a little flyer with several laps to go
but you could tell the 45's were not going to let him go anywhere. He
was quickly brought back. On the bell lap about half way into it Kenny
took off again and Gary missed the move. I was able to get to him and
yelled for him to grab my wheel. He got gapped a little but then
started to recover and off we went. Could not quite close down Kenny's
move but we were just behind. After bonus seconds and all were figured
Gary had closed the deal with 8 seconds to spare.
Final GC:
 

1st Gary Shuey

2nd Kenny Fuller

3rd Robert Wilcox

4th Dirk Cowley

5th Warren Wicks
6th Kim Bleth

7th James Morehouse
8th Mike Birditt
9th Mark Ainslie

Wow, what an event.