Quabbin Classic RR

Men's 40+

Joe K takes a well earned 7th place! Smart ( and of course strong!) riding gets Joe off the front.
Here's how it went down.
"Cool start to the day but beautiful race conditions for the 90+ rider masters 40+ field. The slow neutral start was anything but slow as we were led down the starting hill at 25-30mph. A few solo attacks tried to go early but were brought back easily by the quick moving peloton. I sat in mid pack for most of the first hour trying to conserve and observe. Around mile 25 I reached for my gel flask and it got tangled in my vest and fell out! I thought my day was done with no other calories but some heed in my bottles. A strong group of 5 got away but I decided to play it safe at this point and conserve energy. A solid chase group formed with about 20mi to go. A few riders tried to up the peloton’s pace and attacked to try and catch but to no avail. The pace slowed a touch and I went for it! Attacking hard off the front! I chased solo for what seemed like forever and finally caught the chasers at the base of a climb! Ouch! I managed to stay with them and the six of us worked seamlessly together to try and catch the breakaway riders. Heading into the reservoir for the finish we realized we would not catch the break and some cat and mouse action ensued. Among the six of us was Steve Badger who finished 4^th at Battenkill and we all knew he was the strongest. The six became 4 as two riders came unhitched in the closing kilometers. With 200m to go I was sitting pretty at 4^th wheel and went for it with 200m to go! Only Badger was able to respond and just nipped me at the line. I was super stoked to take 7^th on the day."