Rider Diary: 2011 Candelas Circuit Race by Nolan Brunner

The official announced the JM 10-12 category, and because that was mine, I rolled up to the start. Trevor Way and Peter Whitsel were the only other people who could beat me, so I thought that it wouldn’t be such a hard race, like responding to attacks and they weren’t great climbers so I could probably attack and drop them. The official warned us that there were 30 seconds to the start. I focused on the road ahead. I waited for the official to say 15 seconds, but he didn’t. He said -Riders ready? Go!- I got the hole shot, and I dragged everyone behind me. We got to the first flat, and I looked back and there was no one there. I let them catch up, and then I pulled. I hopped on the back, and let everyone else do the work. I got to the front, then I didn’t care if the pack could keep up or not. Peter was behind me and he fell off, so I was in the front. I increased my lead over the pack in the last, steepest climb. I passed under the finish line, and I saw Peter and Trevor were pretty far behind. I thought they would gain time on the downhill, but not catch me. I threw it in the big ring and hammered on the pedals. I got to the first flat going pretty fast, and when I got to the bottom, I still had a 40 foot lead. I knew that gap would get a lot bigger on the climb. I went a little too far to the inside on the turnaround, but that didn’t matter. I started up the first little climb and I probably increased my lead by about 5 seconds. When I got to the big, last climb, I decided if I wanted to win, I needed to go pretty hard on that hill. I did that, and I won! After I finished, I looked back and saw that Trevor and Peter were pretty far back.

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