Dan Spencer Memorial Road Race Results

The results from the Dan Spencer Memorial Road Race – Pa. Masters State Championships are available from USA Cycling. View the results here.

Thanks everyone for attending this year’s race. Hope to see you next year.

Upcoming Events

A handful of events are scheduled for later this summer and fall.

In celebration of the 25th anniversary of the Dutch Wheelman Bicycle Shop:

• August 1-2: Specialized demo truck with plenty of bikes and accessories for you to try out. If you plan on test riding a bike bring along a driver’s license and major credit card.
  Sat.: 10 a.m – 5 p.m.
  Sun: noon – 5 p.m.
• August 2: Columbia County 50 celebration ride. Calling all current and past Dutchies, family, friends, neighbors, you name it: we’re riding the old race course in celebration of the past 25 years in business. Riders will roll out at 8:30 a.m. from the Bloomsburg Town Park. This ride is free.

October 10: Ride for Awareness – Breast Cancer Awareness Ride. Trek would like to invite you to be a part of the Annual Trek WSD Breast Cancer Awareness Ride. The Dutch Wheelman Bicycle Shop is one of over 100 Trek dealers participating in this nationwide event. Rides of 10 and 20 miles will be offered.

October 11: 3rd Annual Covered Bridges Tour - The Dutch Wheelman Bicycle Shop will host the 3rd annual Covered Bridges Tour in conjunction with the covered bridge arts festival at Knoebels in Elysburg. The rides will be 25, 62 or 100 miles. The scenic routes take you by and through covered bridges in Columbia County. The 100 mile ride is considered one of the toughest with about 7000 feet of climbing.

Results for the 2009 Bloomsburg Town Park Criterium

Event Date: May 24, 2009

Results are in for this year’s Town Park Crit. Sorry for the delay in posting… it’s been a rough week. Thanks to everyone who came out this year and made the event a success. With the date change from mid-June to the Memorial Day weekend we weren’t sure what to expect for a turnout. By the looks of things, we attracted a few more riders this year than last.

Tell your friends, come again next year.

View the results.

Results of the 21st Wheelman’s Cup

April 5, Berwick Test Track, 63 degrees, sunny, dry roads. Wait, this can’t be the Wheelman’s Cup. Or could it be? Yes indeed it was because once again the Lehigh put the drop on the rest of us. Lehigh dominated the TTT, took second on points during the race and then wrapped it up with most points scored on the last lap.

Here’s how it shook out:

Lehigh – 91
Sicklers – 75
Dutchies – 59
Cyclodrome – 15

Looking for the full points breakdown? Download a PDF of the 2009 Wheelman’s Cup Results.

New York State TT Championships

Leading up to Sunday’s NYSTT championships things sort of went like this…

“Hey, you goin to the TT on Sunday”

“Maybe. Are you?”

“I will if you do”

“Okay, I just registered”

“Me, too. See you at your place Sunday morning.”

Sunday morning I pull up to Bob’s house ready to tranfer my gear into his minivan when Bob runs out to tell me not to unload yet, Olympic track racing is on the tube. So, we watch a heat or two of some sort of track event, contemplate staying in and ordering up a round of bloody Mary’s and just say we road the TT. We finally loose our senses completely and decide to head out to Auburn to race the New York Sate Time Trial Championships.

Actually, I was kind of psyched to race again. Although I hadn’t pulled out my TT bike all year, but I looked forward to something different (even though the TT is by far my worst event). The weather was perfect, the venue was relatively close to home, and Bob and I hadn’t done a road trip in a while. So, all was good…pretty much.

Bob was whining as he does, that he wasn’t in the mood to put a hurt on himself, but I knew once the clock started he’d put the hammer down. The course was tough – rollers all throughout, and the wind was blowing from the left front on the way home, but hey, we put in the effort. In the 45-49 category Bob finished sixth; in the 40-44 I finished seventh. But the big bonus was seeing Bob at the end of his ride sitting on the curb looking like someone mugged him with a sock full of quarters. You see, Bob, this is why I talk you into this silly events – to see you look worse than I feel! Ha!!

Seriously, though, it was a fun day and Bob rode well in a category that was loaded with really good time trialers. And hopefully it gave us both a little more motivation to work hard enough to get us through the last few races of the season.

Great Race; Great Results

And while I was tooling around chasing a Pro race around the Finger Lakes on Sunday, Bob Shultz was putting the hammer down at the Great Race team triathlon (run-bike-canoe). His team earned a third place overall; Bob’s TT effort brought him in with the 8th best time out of a field of 236. Nice work, Bob.

Rochester Omnium – being a fan of the road race

Riders cresting Canadice Hill Road early in the race.

This weekend, Aug. 8-10, was a big weekend for road racing in Rochester. 2008 being the fifth year of the Twilight Criterium promoter Scott Page and crew decided to make the big step from a one day to a three day event. By all accounts (from what I could see) it was a huge success for cycling and the entire Finger Lakes region.

I didn’t make it up to the crit on Saturday, but Sunday my wife and I decided to take advantage of a beautiful day and trek out to chase the race. We watched the riders roll out in Honeoye, greeted them high above in Canadice, cheered them on at the KOM in Nunda, watched them scream through Mt. Morris, and cruise north of Avon. We were in awe of the talent on the road and were proud to see everyday people line the roads to see what this bike race thing was all about. There were fans all along the 101 mile route – in village downtowns, lining the big climbs, watching from closed intersections, and sitting out on their front lawns ranging from neighborhoods to the most remote areas of the region.

The New York State Troopers got behind this event 100-percent. Eavesdropping on a conversation between a trooper guarding an intersection and a fan, the trooper mentioned they had over 50 officers assigned to the event and that their Lieutenant made a trip to the Tour of California to learn how to cover a pro bike race. All the troopers seemed excited about working the race and more than one talked about this being the first of many omnium road races to come. I thought it was cool to see the police flying a plane over the race, serving as both a radio repeater and overhead spotter.

Sunday was a great day to be a fan of professional cycling and I was proud to see all the people come out to support the event throughout the region. Chatting with one of the race officials I learned that Saturday’s crit drew approximately 50,000 spectators. That’s great news for western NY and pro cycling.

Here’s a few photos from event including a couple of nice shots of eventual race winner Antonio Cruz.

Dutch Wheelman Score Medals at the Sunbury Road Race

Eight Dutch Wheelman rolled off the start line at the Sunbury Road Race, a hilly 27 mile road race, on Saturday, August 9. Although we missed the overall win, many of the Dutchies captured medals in their age categories. Our successes included:

• Michel was 6th overall, 2nd in age category 1:18:55.434
• Thorr was 9th overall, 3rd in age category  1:19:35.193
• Tim Wynn 12th overall, 1st in age category 1:19:37.993
• Harold 20th overall, 1st in age category  1:21:33:814
• Jim Hennessy 37th overall, 2nd in age category  1:28:06:124
• Helmut Doll 41st overall, out of the money in age category 1:29:17.230
• Bob Rosand 45th overall, 3rd in age category 1:31:57.264
• Bob Margoles 46th overall, 4th in age category 1:31:57.803

View photos from the Sunbury Road Race

by rwmargo

Bronze Metal at the Empire State Games

This year’s Empire State Games summer games (New York state’s olympic-style competition) were held in Binghamton with a road race course that was on par for the event. Cycling’s road race was held on Friday, July 25 over a 15-mile course – open men pedaling 61 miles, masters 46. This course was tough: 2, 000 feet of climbing each lap and no flat stretches long enough to get a good rest. Even the decents were a workout. The downhill sections of the pavement were just rough enough to bounce you side to side at high speed, but not rough enough to be dangerous.

Okay, so I competed in the masters 35-44 race, which was combined with the 45-54 group. The punches started flying at mile one on a long climb up Pennsylvania Avenue. I was covering 4-5 attacks right off the bat – I had to because there was no one to cover for me, didn’t know the course, and didn’t know the riders. Fifteen miles later we hit the feed zone/finish hill as group. By the time we hit the top, the peloton was shattered. What remained was a group of seven up the road and seven of us in the chase group. Our age group’s gold metal winner was in the lead break and there were three of us in the chase. With about  six miles to go, one of the three blew on the back side climb, so there were two left to compete for the podium spots. At this point tactics got strange since two of us were racing and the rest were duking it out for 10th (in the 45+ group). Greg, the other 35+ racer, and I agreed to work together until the bottom of the finish hill and then race. Leading up to the finish we needed to keep the pace fast enough to keep the chaser at bay who was in eye sight. All great plans get laid to waste because by the time I hit the bottom of the hill, my legs were concrete. Greg was able to roll off and I was only able to shift into survival mode. Survival mode was good enough to land a podum place; a bronze metal for me.

It was a tough race for me – covering breaks, closing gaps, minimizing my efforts when I could, and working my 180-pound butt up and down some hard to climb hills. But, I survived and was rewarded for my efforts. My wife, who rarely attends races, along with our good friends Joe and Cathy were there to witness the event. It was fun to share the day with them especially with a little something to celebrate.

Medal winners at the 2008 Empire State Games masters 35-44 cycling road race.

NYS RR Championships – oh so close…

When I first started racing a friend of mine told me there are no moral victories in racing. Basically, you either get the job done, or go home. This could be winning, winning cash, or making a significant effort to help your team.

Lately I’ve felt as if I were a babbler in the sport of road racing. Well, in road racing if you dabble, you get dropped. So after the Bloomsburg weekend I committed myself to focus on two events towards the end of July, one being the New York State Road Race Championships.

Yesterday I woke to a steady rain and the forecast for the remainder of the day wasn’t looking much better – good chance of thunderstorms throughout the day. I debated about going or not and at the last possible moment jumped in the car and headed off to Buffalo (well, Boston, NY, just south of Buffalo). Don’t get me wrong – I don’t mind racing in the rain, I just hate having to strip my bike down after I get home! Going was a good decision because it never rained while I was there. But there was a stiff wind coming out of the west which played a part in how the race unfolded.

I could ramble on forever so I’ll get right to it:

• 10-mile course with a 2.5 mile climb and a 55 mph decent.
• 5 laps for a total of about 53 miles
• small field – 13 riders. 3 were in the 35-39 age group, 10 in the 40-44 group, including me.
• First time up the climb Chris Tirone puts in a surge towards the top. Great move to make since the wind was blowing hard from left to right. If you didn’t jump on, you were gone. I plus 3 others jumped on, a few laps later a sixth bridged up.
• Last lap Mark Paris of Nalgene R3 attacks the climb and stays away. The rest of us thought about working together to reel him in, but the upper section of the climb sorted out the field.
• At the finish, the race paid 5 deep; I was sixth. Bad cramps in the hamstrings forced me to pull up with 1k to go. Of the 6 in the break, 2 were in the 35+ group which put me 4th in my group. Just missed again, oh well.

Like I said at the beginning, there are no moral victories in road racing, but this weekend I wasn’t a dabbler.

Fred