Whitmore comes through with 39 laps to go PHOTO: Casey Gibson
Stage 2 of the Nature Valley Grand Prix was a tough 6 turn criterium in downtown St. Paul. The race organizers have promised a more selective race this year with a few new parcours in the stage lineup and the new stage 2 criterium lived up to the promise. The course featured a few narrow and sharp turns that forced the pack to slow to a near crawl before exploding back up to speed on each lap. Jeremy Powers of Jelly Belly tweeted, “It wasn’t too nice out there, There are some crits that you can move up on. Today wasn’t one of them.” Add in some crashes, and the result is a tough race for everyone just trying to hang on.
The plan for team globalbike was to maintain position, stay out of trouble, and finish GC leader Bobby Sweeting in the front group. Bobby did a good job of staying in the top 30 throughout the race while the rest of the team had mixed results. Boyd Johnson had worked his way up to Sweeting before going down in a crash. “A guy slid out in front of me, and I ran right into him, falling on my hip pretty hard,” said Boyd. Josh Whitmore remarked, “Once I realized it was going to be impossible for me to race at the front to help Bobby, I basically switched into conservation mode, trying to just get through the stage within the time cut. Mission accomplished, I managed to finish and hopefully conserve some energy for the next stage.” In the end Sweeting slipped from 7th in the overall GC to 9th, after Luis Amaran of Jamis/Sutter Home and David Veilleux of Kelly Benefit Strategies each took intermediate time bonus sprints to move up in GC. “I don’t think a few seconds here or there are going to make a huge difference for me right now, the new road race on Saturday and the Stillwater Criterium on Sunday are going to create bigger time differences,” said Sweeting.
This is Clarke's second victory in three races for United Healthcare PHOTO:Epic Images
At the front of the race, the stage came down to a battle between Kelly Benefit Strategies and United Healthcare. For most of the race, GC leader Scott Zwizanski comfortably sat at the back of the string of his Kelly Benefit Strategies team at the front of the pack. His team kept the pace high enough to discourage and disable any breakaway attempts. With several laps to go, the colors on the front of the pack were replaced by United Healthcare who ruthlessly upped the pace to the finish, launching their sprinter Hilton Clarke to the stage win.
“Karl went through the last corner first, and I came off his wheel straight away,” race winner Clarke said. “I just put my head down and went. When I finally looked back, I had a nice gap and I saw Karl coming to the line for second.”
Stage 3 is a 60mile road race in Cannon Falls, MN. The stage profile only offers some rolling hills, but with 20-30mph sustained winds predicted, the racing is sure to tough.
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