Mongolia Bike Challenge
A Taste of Mongolia ... Hope it Does Not Lead to Another Sprint Finish!
Special Report by Cory Wallace / 05.08.2011
The roads resembled braided stream beds as the paths of the vehicles out here constantly change in an effort to avoid the major corrugation problem which is associated with sandy roads. Our lead pack of 14 riders would sometimes be split all over the place as riders tried to find smooth lines but it was pretty much a big guessing game and sometimes it was probably easier just to stay in the line you were in and take the inevitable bumps.
For the first 70 km the lead pack cruised along pretty good with a bunch of different riders splitting the workload. Just after the second feed station Marzio Deho (Olympia) attacked up a small riser, splintering the group with just Craig Richey (NOP Systems- BC Bike Race), Sven Gerber (Cube Bikes) and myself (Kona) going with him. For the next 30 km we worked as a group to gap the other riders and then with 5 km to go the games began.
I went out on the first flyer in an effort to try and get some more time on Deho in the GC but he managed to claw his way back to me. Once he was back on my wheel I let up my pace to give my team mate Craig and Sven a chance to catch up. Once they were back up with us Sven and Craig took charge of the pace setting and I sat behind them with Deho glued to my wheel. It seemed apparent Deho was content on my wheel so I pulled over to the other side of the road and eased up my pace to see if he would chase down the other two riders but he didn’t. He seems completely focused on the overall leader’s jersey as he didn’t show any concern for the stage win today. I was content in having my team mate Craig up the road going for the stage win and made sure I put in a minimal amount of effort as I towed Deho towards the finish.
At the end of the day Craig would take the victory in a sprint over Sven which meant that there have now been 4 different stage winners over the first 4 days of the race. Deho would remain glued to my wheel until 500 m to the line where we sprinted for the finish with myself claiming 3rd by a couple bike lengths. This was more of a psychological victory then anything as we are testing each other in the lead up to the mountain stages to come.
SleepMonsters
