Roden's Road Report

Rochester Giro - Saturday, March 24
By John Roden

After last weekend's double cancellation of the Spring Giro series, Saturday brought more suitable weather to the Rochester area. A decent size field of maybe 50 riders in the "A" race rolled out under calm winds and dry roads. Before the last wisp of smoke had cleared from the starter's pistol, Rob scrambled off the front and made good his escape, dragging along two PC riders and a couple others to make a total of five. After a while, Rob found himself in the situation of riding along with two very strong PC
riders, (Mike Mathis and Ryan Nye) all alone in the world as the pack slumbered along. After a time, all of the break had returned to the fold, with the exception of the two strong youth in orange, which provoked a solid chase effort in the peleton, featuring yeoman like work from Rob, Cheyne and Mark Dux. A bumble and a tumble left PC's Mathis on the floor, uninjured but back with the main group, and a break now consisting of a lone Ryan Nye, cutting his solitary furrow across the Pittsford wasteland. A flurry of late race flat tires left Nye and Gary Egan (Full Moon Vista) sidelined, throwing the race back to square one with five miles left to go. A series of attacks left a group of 10 or so to contest the finish, with PC, Shickluna and JW Dundee's-Home Performance all
with two riders. A textbook "hail Mary" attack from Cheyne Hoag looked like the game winner, but he and his hopes were swept up by the charging pack in sight of the finish line, much like on TV. A final sprint which thankfully featured no crashes but plenty of near misses left PC's Sheske with the victor's laurel, new Shickluna strongman Justin Jones in second and your humble author in third.