U.S. National Road Race Championship Festival Seven Springs, PA

This years National Championship which included Elite, Junior, U23 and Master events was held over a three week period at the Seven Springs Resort in western PA. After several years in Park City, Utah the new venue was a nice change of pace especially since altitude was not a factor for the racers.

7/6 Elite Individual Time Trial (18mi)

This out and back course can only be described as extremely difficult. The first 3mi have the riders ascending out of a State Park; the roads are rolling or feature short steep climbs with off camber turns where speeds of close to 50mph could easily be attained. Our racer on this day was 23 year old Johnny Hayes who started things off with a bang for the team by registering a flying time that landed him in 16th Place.

7/10 U23 Road Race (109mi)

This race was the main event for the Under 23 category. The course was brutal, each lap was a giant 27.3 miles and featured many tough climbs including a 4 miler followed by a 2 miler. The field was large at 139 riders and after each lap roughly 40 riders would go out the back of the peleton.

The team’s mission was to protect our star climber Caleb Fairly as long as possible in an effort to keep him fresh for the final lap. One by one SKNT riders did their part and retired from the race. It was Swain, East and Kuhl that lasted the longest in the service of Fairly. In the end it was all guts and determination with Caleb crossing the line in 10th Place (2nd Amateur). Absolutely fantastic.

7/12 U23 Time Trial (18mi)

The event was held on the same leg breaking course but to make things even more difficult the U23 men raced in a rainstorm with strong hurricane like winds. Caleb and Chris Kuhl desieled away thru the terrible weather and ice skating rink like corners to finish in 20th Place and 27th Place respectively.

7/12 Masters 35+ Time Trial (18mi)

Stephan Badger road into 18th Place in the “old man” race where the winner’s time was 4th fastest amongst all categories.

7/13 U23 Criterium (60km)

This course featured the Jennerstown Speedway. Each lap consisted of a ¾ loop on the car track followed by a technical set of corners built into the infield of the track.

The race started off with a bang as Jon Swain, Mike Chauner and Chris Ruhl repeatedly attacked the field forcing the peleton to chase hard. These attacks where followed by a move which included Alex Ferrero. Shortly after this move was brought back a crash split the field with 6 men moving away. It was Caleb who was in best position and was able to make the juncture to the back of the break before it gained too much distance.

The laps times where very fast at roughly 1:15 each and the gap to the field was about 20 seconds for close to 10 laps. Finally the elastic snapped and the break moved way permanently. At one point the break was close to lapping the field but it was agreed amongst the riders that lapping the field would be chaotic and so the break slowed up to avoid the catch.

The last five laps where all cat and mouse and Caleb did a fantastic job of covering and then attacking several times. In the end it was a numbers game as one team had three riders represented in the break and they were able to roll a rider away in the closing meters. Caleb sprinted into a brilliant 7th Place (once again 2nd amateur) for another top 10 result and Guy East made the top 20 with a 19th Place finish out of the field.

7/13 Masters 35+ Criterium (60km)

Badger continued to rack up top twenty team placings with a very nice 13th Place in the race.

Special thanks go out to all the rider families that came out to cheer on the boys and an extra special thank you goes out to the Fairly’s and the Swain’s for helping set up team accommodations.

For more information on these events visit: www.usacycling.org

For more information visit: www.skntcycling.com