*** GT`s Joe Martin NRC Road Stage Race ***

Arkansas, USA -- 06/02/2005
With the mountain bike season taking a break before the summer
heats up I’ve been using my off weekends to do some road racing.
This weekend I traveled to Arkansas for the only NRC race going
on, the Joe Martin Stage Race.

The race kicked off on Friday afternoon with a 115 mile road race.
The field was about 140 strong with the two biggest domestic road
teams, Health Net and Jelly Belly both represented. There was a 9
mile climb towards the end of the race, but it wasn’t steep enough
to break things up. We ended up with a group of about 50 in the
field sprint coming into town. I wound up 16th in the sprint and
couldn’t do too much as I was around 20th position going through
the last 90 degree corner 300 meters before the finish.

We didn’t start until almost 2:30 so we finished around 7pm.

The next days stage was another road race, this time 94 miles
and it started at 8am. We barely had 12 hours between the two
stages. The course on Saturday had a short, steep climb we did
3 times but again the field stayed together and we ended in a
downhill 45 mph field sprint. One word for this, sketchy!

I got head butted by some Team Monex guy because
I tried to jump on their sprint train. I think I ended up
about 8th in that sprint.

Later that same day we had a 2.5 mile uphill time trial and finally
a chance to shake up the GC. The route averaged 7% which isn’t
too bad when you’re at sea level. I managed a 5th and was able to
move up to 6th place in GC.

Sunday was the last day and we did a 60 mile crit in down town
Fayetteville. The course was lined with people and had a tough
climb to the finish. I was able to get in a break towards the end
of the race but I was with a Health Net guy that wouldn’t work
because his team mate was higher then me in GC and if we were
to stay away I would have overtaken him. We were absorbed by
the group about 6 laps from the finish and the winning move went.

Only 20 people out of the 140 finished the race in the lead group
and I think I held on to my 6th place in GC. I had to catch a flight
right after the race so I couldn’t stick around to see results.

I packed my bike in 12 minutes in the parking
lot and made it to my flight right on time.

The announcer on Sunday couldn’t stop talking about how a
mountain bike racer was mixing it up with the pro road guys in
their big NRC race. He was also surprised that I was riding for
GT because like everyone else I talked to in Arkansas, he thought
they went out of business. I assured everyone that GT was in fact,
not out business but supporting the best mountain bike team in the
US and had plenty of new products coming down the pipe including
the new road bike with out a triple triangle.

It was another good weekend for the GT/Hyundai team.

CC -
http://www.gtbicycles.com/pavement/news/detail.php?id=1421&country=usa&brand\
=pave

Geneb...Wenatchee,Washington-USA
All Things Northwest in BMX!
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