2019 Speed of Light WorldTour: Team Time Trial Night


SOL Start.jpgSOL Start.jpg

Keen, M22, and Hagerty went bar-to-bar for the prestigious TTT title last night on the first sandy, hot night of the year.

After a week of texts, emails, and banter, the Team Time Trial finally hit the start line…and promptly blew up. Keen, M22, and Hagerty rallied the troops for one of the biggest turnouts of the year, with Norte sending a strong mix of veterans and youngsters to fight for the fastest time. If you aren’t familiar, the TTT is a unique format. Each club’s third rider counts as their time. It’s a mass start, so teams have to communicate and stay alert to identify that third rider. Every third rider counts as another team, so Hagerty’s big turnout meant they had three full squads to eat up points.

For Keen, it was all hands on deck, and they were quick to throw down the gauntlet. Eli Brown took the holeshot, with M22 quickly taking over as they hit the first slope of the CC Climb.They were present and correct, with Jason Johnson, Sunset Scott, and John O’Hearn right at the head of affairs. It was Keen to mark the move with Owens and Pulliam, but they decided to leave Marc Brunette to his own devices, stuck in a big chase group that was speckled with a number of other squads.

That chase group came apart and back together a number of times, with kolo t.c. urging Wes Sovis in the wheels, It wasn’t his best day on the bike, and while he battled on, Dan and Cody were left freewheeling and watching the race move up the trail. Brunette was committed, however, and kept a high pace over the Power Section, with a few pulls from Cody when Wes was in touch.

With M22 up to trail, it was a battle for second. Garrett Jenema went with the leaders, and that meant his Hagerty teammates had to find and protect that third rider. It turned out to be Austin Johnson and Max Meyer, who was just behind Brunette for third. Brad Pauly and the ‘All In The Family’ duo of Chad and Charlie Black led the way for Norte, with Hagery scoring another squad in the top five.

With Cody scanning the dying light of dusk for a teammate, out of the dust road Dan Ellis, who’d fished out Jaden Drews. Coaxed to new heights, Drews salvaged some points for the squad, with Wes in turn leading in a second squad which counted Andy Weir and Sara Sovis as their three riders.

Our two unaffiliated squads performed well, with Lance Bass (Sam Holmes, Kent McNeil, Jon Zelinski), and Yellow Breasted Pine Finch (Trent G., Erica O’Hearn, and Jason Barnes) picking up a handy haul of points.


Screenshot (2404).pngScreenshot (2404).png

M22’s success has completely changed the WorldTour, with John O’Hearn making up nearly his entire deficit to move just one point shy of Cody for the lead, with Jeff Owens also moving much closer with Keen’s performance. Brad Pauly, Garrett Jenema, and Sunset are the other big winners of the day, all well ensconced in the top ten.

Next week, we’re doing BOTH Singlespeed and Cyclocross Night before a week off for the Fourth of July. Singlespeeds have to be a single cog (no zip-ties, sorry), with CX bikes limited to 700c wheels and 42c tires. It looks like riding a SSCX will be worth TRIPLE points, so if you don’t have one, GET ONE.

For all the SOL info, make sure you’re IN the Strava Gent’s Club for rides, fake races, and other barely-valuable tidbits of knowledge. We also have a Slack channel for SOL, TNR, and more.

All the results are updated here.

The WorldTour picture is painted here.

A WordPress.com Website.

%d bloggers like this: