Newest Team racer Larry Merling rode to an impressive 6th place ( on a Bianchi! )
Cat 4
The weather pretty much sucked the whole race. We had lightning, thunder, torrential downpours, heavy flooding, slippery roads, crashes and cold temps. Unfortunately, it was race organization and officiating, not the weather, that decided the cat 4 race.
Halfway into our 4th loop (out of 5), the 45+ masters started catching up to our group so the official, who was on a very poorly marked car, neutralized our group. However, because of the poorly marked car and the slightly downhill section, 8 or so riders had gone slightly ahead of the rest of the group during the time he was attempting to neutralize the group. After we realized it was an official and figured out what was going on, some of us started yelling at the other riders but they either did not hear us or decided to ignore us. After we told the official what happened, he advised us that he would go after the riders and let them know and get the group back together. Unfortunately, he never did tell them while we slowed down the race thinking that it would be game on once we were all back together. Then to make matters worse, someone completely miscounted our laps and stop our race 1 lap too short. We were told at the start we would the 8 mile loop 5x and we finished on our 4th lap. Riders literally crossed the finish line thinking we had the last lap to group together to decide the race but instead were told that our race was over. Nice!
Needless to say, the organizer and official both apologized for their screw up later on but decided to uphold the results based on the fact that the leading group were never told that we were neutralized.
Oh well, what are you going to do? We all make mistakes I guess. Despite the weather and bad officiating, still glad I came out to race. Good practice for bad weather racing...
Joe P
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