Myogensis June-July Report

by Brady Rogers

It’s been a while since I have checked in with my write ups for the Myogenesis Nutrition pb Landmark Dodge elite cycling team. Not much has happened since the March on Savannah took place. I will briefly touch on the things that did go down though.
Several of the guys made the trip over to Birmingham to do a couple of crits, and stretch their mid season legs. Jon, Cleve and Travis all finished with good results with Jon pulling a 2nd .

Union City was the following weekend, and Brady, Cleve and Casey would make that long journey to the southside of town to race the Union City Mayor’s race. Time trail on Saturday morning would not see the Myogenesis guys perform their usual, except for Casey really stepping it up a notch and finishing towards the front. Later that afternoon, the boys would take to the course at Shannon Mall for what was to be a very fast and flat crit. Looking around, we saw several regional powerhouse squads, as well as some very fast individuals. All went well and we got Casey into a top 5 finish. The road race Sunday morning, on very rolling course in south Fulton County, would have plenty of action. We were determined to be in the middle of it all, since we had guys looking good for the GC. Last lap of the race, the winning break went away, with both of our GC guys in it, and the others around them not present. That’s the way it ended, with Casey taking another top 5 and podium in the overall.

Now that we are caught up on our vacation, time to get back to work. Work is exactly what was on the books for the weekend of July 22 and 23. This is when the next installment of the Georgia Cup was to take place, in what is quickly becoming the next cycling center of Georgia, Rome. Myogenesis would be entering into this race with one mission, get the white jersey back, or at least keep it in sight. We had our battle plans laid out, and now all we had to do was execute. We went into the crit with a mission, and that was to get as many MAR points as possible, because it would help in our chase for the white. We ended up taking 15 points in the competition. With the MAR points, Jon would now be draped in the RED Most Aggressive Riders Jersey (an unintended extra of the races efforts). Not only was the job of the team IN race critical, but it turns out that a member of our Cat 3 team would play a major role as well. Towards the beginning of the race, Jon broke his chain, thinking of the huge loss for the weekend, went to the pits…Andy Scarano threw his bike at Jon. Jon jumped on Andy’s Blue RC-5AL, SEVERAL sizes too small (XL to a MD). Not only did Jon take the bike, but Andy’s shoes as well…once again SEVERAL sizes too small. So with all that working against him, taking half the primes in the race showed our determination. The later half of the race would see a lot of action, with attack after attack. Every time something threatening looked to be forming, guest strongman, Ryan Barnett moved to the front to make sure the pace stayed high in order to chase it down. In the end, Peter Hatton from Jittery Joes was able to maintain a solo gap and hold on for the win, with Jon coming in 6th after a great lead-out from the team. Casey 8th , Cleve 10th and Ryan 11th and Brady 23rd.

Sunday morning would great us with the sunrise…wait we we’re up well before that, since we had an 8am start 30 miles away. So going into the road race, we knew we had our work cut out for us. Mauricio Oscar Heneo, the quaint Columbian climber, who is just in front of Jon in the overall, was present and this course had a quaint climb in it. Needless to say our work was cut out for us. The action started fairly quick with several guys going from the start. Not that this was of any danger, it just looked fun, so myself along with several others went to bridge across. After going for several miles, we finally reached our goal, and now we we’re 8. I was just hoping this move would extend my being involved in the race, by allowing me and all my super climbing prowess, to make it over the aforementioned quaint climb before the herd behind me caught up. It worked, but we were soon caught. The good news is that the group that caught us had only about 20 or so guys left in it. Now there were 5 Myogenesis guys in the front group and into the second of three laps. We knew this was when the decisive split would happen, the second time up that 3K 10% average grade quaint climb. That is exactly what happened. This time up and over only Casey, Cleve (of the mountains), and Ryno would make it over in contact, with Brady and Jon making it over in the shattered remains of what, from here out, will be referred to as “the bus”. The lead group would start its selection process several miles before the climb with Tiago DePaula attacking and taking several with him, including a Myogenesis representation. The climb lurked in everyone’s mind, because it was obvious the winning move would go there. After it was all said and done Cleve held on to an impressive, hard 6th place. With the results of the road race in……Cleve Blackwell in 4th , Ryan Barnett in 8th, Casey Magner and Jon Atkins 11th and 12th and Brady Rogers 19th in the overall. Good weekend overall, Cleve still in the KOM jersey, Jon in the MAR jersey and still with the white overall in sight!