Locked and loaded the blue bus transported us to the dust bowl of the east garrison for the first race of the season. The warm windy day and long hilly lap made for a tough but fun race.
In morning we had a mob in the masters with Greg Foy and Detlef Adam in the mens 55+. In the 60+ field we had even more with Mark Michel and Mark Brown making a return to racing. Rick Ortenblad had the best race coming in 5th and I was 6th about 30 seconds back. John Vahlberg was our sole representative in the men's 45+ A field.
The juniors were out in force with Manny Affonso , Lindsay Schmidt , Dan English and Nathan Vahlberg ( hope I got the first name correct....)
Kathleen Bortolussi returned to racing after a few years off. She got a nice 2nd place in her age group.
Campbell steers really made it a race in the women's elites , leading the chase group in pursuit of a lone leader. This lasted until the last lap. She still hung in there for 4th place. Also in the race was Allison Peck and Sarah Kerlin. Former team mate and olympian Shelly Olds just beat out Campbell for 3rd. New team member Amanda Schaper was in the mix eventually finishing 7th.
We had a real mob in the men's elite race with Eric Brown, Josh Vahlberg, John Vahlberg and Brendan Lehman. Brendan led the race for at least 6 laps showing some early season fitness. He eventually faded to 7th in the last two laps.
Ian Stowe elected to race single speed and showed that he's one of the best in Nor-Cal finishing 2nd.
The Chardonnay was flowing and the horns were honking-the van was smoking and the racing season had officially started. So begins the long and crazy 2017 edition of Nor-Cal coastal cyclocross.
