Safety City Criterium
April 1, 2006
By Ryan Bloom

Legs were fresh, the sun was shining, and the entire ACCC was heading up to Druid Hill Park for our own Safety City Criterium for the first race of the weekend.

The course was sketchy enough to scare off a few competitors in the weeks leading up to the race (three in particular from Towson). However, with the work of about a half dozen team members and a few brooms, it was made into a fairly safe and smooth course by Saturday morning.

The first race of the day was the Men’s C. The Hop had 5 men representing us: Smitty, Bolster, Termite, Igor, and Jake. Smitty, Bolster, and Termite worked together wonderfully in the pack, avoiding all the crashes and trying to cover most of the breaks and surges. It all worked out in the end, with the three of them finishing in the top twenty; Smitty leading the way in 10th, with Termite and Bolster not too far behind in 13th and 17th respectively. Jake and Igor each showed their determination, getting some great experience as well, on the way to 37th and 22nd place finishes respectively.

Next up on the day was the women’s B’s. Our girls in the race, Jess Chin, Lauren Singer, and P Mok, were determined to prove that they were the strongest team in the race. It all went according to plan, with Singer poised for a podium finish at the last lap, when a squirrly girl from UVA couldn’t contain her excitement and swiped out Lauren’s wheel ending her race a half a lap early. Luckily, Jess and P Mok were able to avoid the crash securing excellent places for themselves, in 4th and 11th respectively.

After that, the Men’s B’s took the course. The usual squad made their appearance with the addition of Pete Sargent, who, despite not having ridden in the past 5 months, decided to come out and help the team. At the sound of the gun, Pete got his old race legs back, and took the race out in a blistering pace, leaving the rest of the pack, huffing and puffing, behind. However, after the first few laps, the lack of mileage caught up to our sprinter and he unfortunately fell off the back. That left me, Cohee, Toby, and Nathan to control the race for Hopkins. Unfortunately, a quick rain shower around noon left the tight turn around the back of the course slick and dangerous. Toby got to know this turn quite well as he fell not once, but twice, within 5 laps of each other, ending his race too. Nathan, despite having lost two teammates, had a great race, holding a solo breakaway for almost 10 laps. Despite being caught, he still finished 2nd by just half a tire length to a strong rider from UVA. Cohee and I, having got caught behind Toby’s crashes, had a hard time catching back up to the lead pack, but still finished 21st and 20th respectively.

Finally, the Women’s A’s were up, with our own Katie Ross donning the Hopkins colors. The pace was furious from the gun leaving many competitors in the dust early in the race. However, Katie made a valiant effort to bridge back up to the lead pack late in the race and came away with a terrific 11th place finish.

All in all, it was a great showing for Hopkins on our home course. In addition to this, a big thank you is in order to Cliff for directing a smooth and well organized race that received high complements from other teams and the race officials as well.