Galena Road Race Report

Crushman on the podium

by Peter Monko

This past weekend 12 Spidermonkeys decided to head into the hills of Galena for the Tour of Galena road race and omnium.  So what’s an omnium?  The term comes from track cycling in which racers would compete in a series of different races and the best overall cyclist would win. In road cycling the concept is the same, although the scoring is a bit different.  In the case of the Tour of Galena the omnium consisted of a circuit race (for category Pro/1/2 and 3(women only)), a 3.7 or 6 mile long individual time trial (depending on your category), an extremely hilly road race and a fast downtown criterium full of cupcake primes.

The Tour of Galena was promoted and put on by xXx-Racing who did an excellent job running the race safely during a hot busy weekend in tourist friendly Galena.  After missing the TOG last year, I decided to make this race a priority and entered the Masters 30+ cat 4/5 omnium competition with about 25 other racers, including Ben Sparks. PJ Cavoto, Hayes Sansborn, Kristi Hanson, Sarah Rice and Brandon Diffenderfer also competed in the full omnium.  The overall omnium competition resembled a lot of what a typical collegiate road cycling weekend is like in the spring except that the bikes are much fancier, and there are actual prizes, podiums and leader’s jerseys.  It was quite a difference from the laid back nature of collegiate races to see racers writing down their competition’s bib numbers on their arms after seeing the time trial results to know who to keep their eye on during the road race. When champagne and gift baskets are on the line you’ll do some crazy things I guess.

My race weekend got off to a poor start after forgetting my helmet at home and I was not looking forward to having to buy a crappy helmet from Walmart Friday night.  Fortunately a friend from Team Tati hooked it up with an extra helmet he found under his bed.  After a less than stellar time trial with a 13th place finish it was time to go back to our rental condo to fuel up and mentally prepare for the big daddy of the weekend, the road race. The majority of Spidermonkeys racing this race, which included those just racing the road race (David Cushman, Tim Driver, Kim Brokhof and Masayuki Tsuchiya) have ridden the course before and knew what to expect in terms of climbs and technical spots.That preparation and hard work training really paid huge dividends this Saturday, especially given the hot, windy conditions.  Out of the 9 Spidermonkeys that started the road race, 6 of us got top 10 finishes with Dave Cushman winning the men’s cat 4 and Kim Brokhof winning the Women’s cat 4 in her first road race EVER!  Given that roughly a quarter or more of most fields DNF’ed because of the brutal conditions made the Spidermonkey performance in this road race even more impressive.

Kim Brokof on the podium
Photo by K.Hanson

The Master’s 4/5 30+ road race went off at 12:30pm with temps in the 90s. With 45 miles of racing, I was worried that 4 water bottles would be enough. On a pre-ride of the course in similar weather in May I started cramping near one of the big climbs on North Ford Rd. To stave off possible cramps, I gave Sarah a waterbottle of pickle juice to hand up to me in the feed zone during our 2nd lap just in case.

After a short neutral rollout to just past the feed zone, the race began with a nice leisurely pace until the first climb. The racer in the leaders jersey responded to an attack with two or three other riders and it was pretty clear that a breakaway was forming. I waited until two more riders jumped before I sat on their wheels and made the bridge up to the breakaway group.  We had 8 fairly strong riders in this breakaway and almost immediately Dave Kiel in the leader’s jersey started organizing the group by forming a fast moving echelon to combat the crosswinds.  The pace went up and a couple of riders got dropped but our gap over the main field kept increasing.

At one point just before starting our second lap, the referee on the motorycle told us our gap was just under 3 minutes.  Masa and Ben did some great blocking work in the chase group to help keep us away and we were able to slow down a bit through the feed zone where I picked up my pickle juice and a bottle of water. Unfortunately the cramps already started and I was in some severe pain on the following climb and I couldn’t keep up with the breakaway any longer. However I felt like I had a decent enough lead to not sit up and get caught by the chasers. So for the next 15 or so miles I rode solo just trying to survive the cramping.  About 5km before the finish I got caught by one rider and asked if he wanted to do some work together.  Apparently he didn’t, and I ended up towing him up to the final few turns where I tried to drop him but was outsprinted by half a wheel and came in at 7th place.

That race was one of the hardest efforts I gave in recent memory and couldn’t imagine doing another lap or 2 which Sarah and Brandon had to do.  Even though it was pretty difficult, I think that is the most exciting road race in Illinois and one of the best in the Midwest. If you want a true road racing experience in a single weekend with some beautiful scenery and kick your butt climbs you should consider doing Tour of Galena next year, I know I’ll be back.