July 19/09 8:18 am - Tour de Whiterock: Stage 2, a Win for Pinfold

Posted by Editoress on 07/19/09
 

Pinfold, Jazz Apple atop podium at Maximum Collision Criterium at 30th Tour de White Rock

A familiar theme is developing at BC Superweek, with North Vancouver's Andrew Pinfold and the Jazz Apple women's team atop the Criterium podium at the 30th anniversary of the Tour de White Rock.

Pinfold, riding for California-based Ouch Pro Cycling, won a bunch sprint to claim his second-straight Tour de White Rock Criterium on Saturday night. And in the women's race, Jazz Apple repeated its 1-2 finish from the HillClimb on Friday night, but this time it was Marina Duvnjak running away for the win, and Lauren Ellis winning a sprint for second place.

Despite the familiar finish, Pinfold's win wasn't always a sure thing.

Canadian Olympian Zach Bell of Kelly Benefit Strategies broke away to chase a huge $1,232 crowd prime with 10 laps left, but lost to Jesse Reams of the local Garneau Evolution team in a photo finish so close officials had to zoom in to individual pixels to determine a winner. Bell kept pushing, and built a sizeable lead with three laps left in the 60-lap race, only to be reeled in his final trip around the one-kilometer course through the streets of White Rock.

"I knew Zach was going to get caught -- he was dying -- so I just went straight for him and was able to make it around the last corner," said Pinfold, who had plenty of help from Ouch teammate Cam Evans en route to finishing the 60-km race in one hour, one minute and 00.7 seconds. "If you can make it around the last corner, you pretty much win the race."

Bell's teammate Ryan Anderson was second, passing Tyler Trace of local Trek Red Truck racing in the short straightaway after the final corner.

"I got a little bit of a jump on Tyler, but Pinner, his jump is just too much so if you're not leading coming around that last corner there's no chance," said Anderson, who did hold off Pinfold in the Tour de Delta Criterium a week earlier en route to the Tour de Delta overall title.

Anderson admitted there's no shame losing to Pinfold, who beat ProTour rider Chris Horner (Astana) in a sprint to win last year's Tour de White Rock criterium, and also won last Sunday's Tour de Delta road race. But for a while he thought his teammate, Bell, might stay away.

"With three to go he still had a pretty good gap but then Jamie Sparling from Trek Red Truck put in a pretty good dig at the end and took a substantial chunk out of Zach's break," said Anderson. "It was an all right situation. I could just slot in behind teams that were chasing, and rest up the last few laps so it ended up being a pretty good situation: two of us in the race and one was up the road and I was getting ready for the bunch."

Sparling's hard work reeling in Bell also paid off for his teammate, Trace, who called his third-place finish the best result of his racing career.

"This is probably my biggest result, so I'm pretty happy," said a beaming Trace. "Everybody was lining up and all I wanted to do was be on Pinfold's wheel because he is the best out there and it all worked out well for me."

It also worked out pretty well for Reams, who was second in the Tour de Delta Prologue last week, but admitted Saturday's big crowd prime was a bigger deal, especially since it came side by side with Bell, who came over the top and threw his bike at the line to create the tight photo finish.

Like Bell, Reams is from Watson Lake in the Yukon. In fact, the 20-year-old lived with Bell's dad, Greg, for a few years before moving to the lower mainland in September -- in part because he was inspired by Zach's performances on the world stage, including silver at recent World Cup and World Championships on the track, and in part because "it's hard to train seriously when there's snow on the ground over half the year."

"That was ridiculous," Reams said of Saturday's sprint to $1,232. "Zach was right up there and I beat him to the corner coming to the top of the hill and managed to hold him off. I don't know how. It means a lot to me, I've known him a long time and he's one of my idols in cycling."

Ream's idol nearly turned the near-miss in the crowd prime into a win in the Maximum Collision Criterium, Instead, though, it will be Pinfold, Bell's former teammate on Symmetrics, wearing the leader's jersey when Tour de White rock continues on Sunday with the Peace Arch News road race.

"With only one teammate we had to play it smart and Cam was really riding well and I didn't want to expose myself too early," said Pinfold, who was fifth in Friday's Hillclimb. "I always had tomorrow in the back of my mind because that's such a hard race, so if you can conserve a little bit here it's better."

Speaking of conserving energy, it was hard to believe Duvnjak had much left for Saturday's Criterium after finishing second in Friday's Hillclimb, which requires the top-5 riders from the first heat to ascend the 700-meter, 16 degree grade again in a head-to-head race to the podium.

Somehow, though, Duvnjak broke away with 10 laps left in the 30-lap race and almost lapped the field before cruising to victory, finishing the 30-kilometer Criterium in 40 minutes, and 57.2 seconds Saturday.

"I was a little bit paranoid," said Duvnjak, who will also wear the women's leader's jersey in Sunday's road race. "I was slowing down and I was like you can't be out there for five laps and get caught on the last lap so I've got to go, I've got to go, I've got to go, I can't muck it up now."

The deep Jazz Apple team softened the field – and racked up prime lap wins – with more than a half dozen attacks over the first 20 laps, and had Duvnjak and Lauren Ellis in the break with 10 left. Duvnjak quickly opened up a big gap on that group too, and Ellis, a fellow Kiwi, won a sprint to finish second, just over a minute behind her teammate.

"We knew we had to have Dotsie (Bausch, who won Friday's Hillclimb) or myself in there and then a maximum of five riders because we did well at the Hillclimb and wanted to keep the overall," said Duvnjak, who also won the Tour de Delta Road Race last weekend, while Ellis took criterium and overall titles. "When the break happened Lauren said she felt like crap and I felt pretty bad too, but I was like ‘you know what, this seems to be spreading the field.' I looked back and said ‘why not give it a go,' and once you get into a rhythm, believe it or not it's easier. Instead of having to go and slow down and go, you can just get into your own rhythm."

Heather Kay (ERTC/Revolution) of Sherwood Park, Alberta finished third, matching her spot on the podium in the Hillclimb the night before.

"It was fabulous to get in a breakaway. The corners are faster when you're not in a big group," said Kay, adding both podiums represented her best finishes in three years coming to the Tour de White Rock, though she's had top-10 finishes in all three races. "I wanted to get in a breakaway that had at least one Jazz Apple rider in it. I knew it would stay."

Kay also knows from experience how tough Sunday's road race will be, with several severe climbs at both ends of the scenic start-finish line on White Rock beach. Duvnjak is riding her first Tour de White Rock, but has seen what's coming, and knows it's not going to be easy on Sunday.

"Tomorrow's course, I don't think I need to mention it if you've seen it, that's tough," said Duvnjak, a 28-year-old who has been riding 13 years, and also won the Tour de Delta road race last Sunday. "I am confident in my fitness at the moment, it's probably the fittest I've been for years. And I'm just excited and I think that's carrying me through the weekend more than anything else I emailed my boyfriend and I was like ‘I'm just so happy,' I didn't want to sleep last night. I just want to race."

In addition to being the Tour de White Rock finale, Sunday's Peace Arch News Road Race is also the final event in the 10-day, six-race BC Superweek. It will be followed by a celebration of 30 years of the Tour de White Rock and its key roll in creating Canadian Olympic cyclists, including live music, a special appearance by the Vancouver 2010 Mascots, and a chance to meet Olympic Athletes, including Tour de White Rock racers Zach Bell and Erinne Willock, as well as Janice Birch, the 1996 Olympic silver medal winner in synchronized swimming, and Lynn Kanuka, a bronze medalist in track and field at the L.A. Olympic Games.

Report by Kevin Woodley, Media Relations Coordinator