August 12/03 9:49 am - MORE Montreal-Quebec, Pan Am Games ITT Results

Posted by Editoress on 08/12/03
 

More Montreal-Quebec

Jeff Hansen has sent in a report

Seeing as I was there I can say exactly what happened:

Steve Rover, Czeslaw Lukaszewicz and I had formed a break of around 30 seconds (reported correctly) and we were together at the tracks.

Rover (i.e. not me) led the charge over the tracks - while Czeslaw and I slowed down a bit. But we both eventually followed.

The remaining 4 riders who were disqualified came across after we passed -- one of which (Peter Morse) made it across to our group of 3.

We then continued for 3 or 4 kms before we were told to stop by one of the lead motos and then utimately DQed 15 minutes later ....

Note: that this situation was a little exceptional in the fact that our break was told nothing of a train crossing before we got to it. It was at the bottom of a hill and we did not even see it until several hundred metres because of the curve of the road and the hill. Seeing as there was a commissaire **right** beside us on a moto the sitution could have been handled a lot better if he gave us some direct instructions to avoid all the confusion.

All we saw was a bunch of policemen with their arms outstretched saying 'stop'. After 5 hours of racing in the rain it takes a little while to process that.

Anyway -- the only other thing I can say about the situation was that after 15 years of racing it was a pretty dumb move to cross the tracks in this situation -- especially since I was feeling pretty good with just over 50km to go -- and I probablly cost the team some prize money and UCI points.

It was also the first time I have ever been disqualified while at the front of a race....


Pan Am Games Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic