Stage Three

Stage 3: Cannon Falls Road Race.

At only 66 miles this course isn’t much to look at, but the finishing circuit and the run-in to it make this a real mother of a stage, even without the notorious Midwestern winds. After ~55 miles on rolling Minnesota roads the course comes back into town via dirt road that funnels you onto a one lane descent into town that has some of the worst pavement I’ve ever seen. This spits you out to do 5 laps of a 2 mile circuit that put the fear in me. It features a bunch of tricky turns including my personal favorite, a downhill off camber chicane. Absolute madness.

I started the stage still feeling a little banged up from the crash the night before and with the first KOM only 3.6 miles into the stage I was a bit worried. But my sis did a little recon and let me know that that first KOM was the worst climb of the stage so that put my mind at ease.

We lit out at a pretty good pace and kept a decent clip for most of the race. There were constantly moves going off the front, but everyone was fired up so nothing really got any time on the field. At one point I was off the front with Chad Gerlach and we got a little gap, but there aren’t really any turns or hills or anything so we couldn’t get out of sight. After he yelled for a while about no one bridging up we got reeled in. He eventually got away by himself and snagged himself the most aggressive rider jersey after a couple dozen miles solo off the front.

The only bit of real excitement during the stage was when some numb-nuts slammed on his brakes while everyone was eating and there was a big pileup. I got caught behind but didn’t go down and it all came back together. When we were nearing the circuit our man Josh got on the radio and told us to move up before the gravel. I swung wide, got up a good head of steam and managed to get into the gravel very first. I led it for a little ways, but the Ouch train came around right as we were passing the cyclingnews photog. Curses! The top of my helmet is prominently featured sitting 5^th wheel.

The circuits were, in my estimation, insane. People were taking some big chances and really hauling around the course, and I was swarmed and spat backwards to a position not to my liking. So be it. With a few days left to race I wasn’t willing to lay it all on the line quite yet. I rolled it in with all my skin still on my body and no time gaps to speak of.