by Mitch Askew
March 16, 2003
Ride Kellytown (in the words of Roy from RBM this ride is part of Greg's "Pain-train"
Mileage 60 miles
Ave. speed 22+
Terrain Rolling with steep short climbs and several sprints
John Mcwhorter, Chris "Madman" Jackson, and Mitch Askew showed up on Sunday to do the Kellytown ride. Every person
except one or two were racers. We took a right out of the parking lot and literally "warmed up" at 27 mph for the first 3 - 5 miles. The pace simmered down to
abbot 21-25 after that. The first sprint was almost taken by our Madman (Chris). I was at the back of the 30 person pack enjoying the show. The next sprint was taken by the
Genesis tandem team, with Roy taking second, and myself in third. I immediately countered post the sprint, but all 30 peeps were right behind me. Throughout the ride about 2/3 sat in the back enjoying the draft, while the rest of us worked a strong fast pace line keeping the pace up around 25. Heck, I even went to the back on several occasions to eat, drink and rest before getting back into the pace line. The pace line itself was text-book. It was fast, but fun because everyone in the pace line knew what they were doing and worked well with one another.
The last 5 Km to the final sprint, I found myself in the front with Madman Chris and two others working the line and stringing everyone out. Chris would pull until he blew, then I would do the same, and then the other two riders. As we got within 2 km Chris was pulling and tried to pull off, but the other two riders would not let him. I,
couldn't stand seeing that done to a teammate, immediately went to the front and to the tops of my bars to relieve Chris a little bit. I then began to suffer and went to my drops and pulled for a little longer. The other two riders started to pull after that. After their pull, I pulled one more time short and hard and blew. Madman Chris did the same thing and we both dropped off. At that exact same moment, John Mcwhorter who had been about 7 or 8 riders back launched off of the front with a 30 yard gap instantly. With less than 1 Km to go, it was an unplanned but perfect lead out by Chris and myself for our teammate John. Two others caught John and John got third in the final sprint. From a helo, I am sure it would have looked like a perfectly planned team effort and we really came together. At the end of the day John said "it is a shame we all three race three different categories".