July 15/12 9:57 am - Tour de White Rock: Stage 2, Shaw wins

Posted by Editoress on 07/15/12
 

Canadian champion puts on a cycling clinic at the Tour De White Rock’s Choices Market Criterium on Saturday night.

Photos by Greg Descantes

Women

Rhae Shaw, wearing the Maple Leaf jersey as the current Canadian Criterium champion, built a sizeable gap during the 30-kilometre women’s race, piling up preem money before crossing the finish line alone for the victory.

Shaw, who missed the start of BC Superweek while pursuing an official protest of being left off the Canadian Olympic road cycling team she was on the short list for, completed the 30-lap race in 41 minutes and 9.9 seconds.

“Admittedly I am really disappointed to not be named to the Olympic team,” said Shaw, who was also second in the Time Trial at the recent Canadian Nationals, and won a silver medal in it at the 2012 Pan Am Championships. “But in the meantime I have really good fitness and I love to race my bike, so here I am.”

Shaw, 36, races better than most in Canada. She has piled up impressive results in Europe, and was seventh in the Time Trial at the World Championships last year, which also just happened to be her first year riding full time.

An Ontario native now living in Seattle and racing for Exergy Twenty12, Shaw switched from triathlons to cycling in 2011, and quit her job as the technical advisor to the CTO at Microsoft to focus on qualifying for the Olympics.

“I wanted to make sure I took the opportunity to race my bike while I was still young and had the fitness to do it,” Shaw said. “I would rather race my bike with a few ‘oh wells’ rather than ‘should have, could haves,’ so looking forward I’m going to continue to race for as long as I love it.”

It certainly looked like Shaw, who was second in Friday’s grueling Hillclimb, was enjoying her domination at the 33rd Tour de White Rock, winning six of eight preem laps before cruising across the finish line by herself with arms raised.

“It’s fantastic to race when a community is so behind it and it really pushes the racers,” Shaw said.

Utah’s Nicky Wangsgard, a university professor in her final year of pro cycling for Primal/MapMyRide before becoming a team director, won a sprint for second in the women’s race – a little less than seven seconds behind Shaw, and 1.1 ahead of Quebec’s Joanie Caron, who rides for Coalvita-espnW Pro Cycling.

“I was going to go for some preems, but Rhae Shaw kept beating me to them,” said Wangsgard, who just turned 40. “This might be my last crit so I’m just trying to enjoy every moment and to be on the podium with her is a privilege.”

Caron also tipped her proverbial cap to Shaw, a teammate on the Canadian National Team.

“I know how fast she can go,” said Caron. “We should never have let her go.”

The nine-stage $105,000 BC Superweek and the 33rd Tour de White Rock both wrap up with the Peace Arch Road Race on Sunday morning.

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