The weather was a little nippy before the start of round one in the 2014 O-Cup series. I wanted to wear my vest, but it blocked one of my race numbers… One of the commissaries threatened to fine me, so being broke, I decided to take my vest off. Brrrrr!

My only motivation to get in the break was to warm up. Just kidding! In every Ontario race that I can remember, the break goes, the pack yawns, and that’s all she wrote. Derrick St. John and Bruce “Birdman” Bird started to hit it pretty hard, and eventually a split of a dozen or so riders made it off the front. We stayed away for a little while, but the peloton caught us about 5k later. The pace had been fast up to that point, so I knew the counter-attack would probably be the be-all, end-all for the day. Sure enough, moments later I snuck away with Bruce, Derrick, Fred Cossette and Bayden Pritchard.

The five of us worked well together during the next hour and a half, but the Peloton always had us at arm’s reach. Nearing the end of the race, Jack Burke and Derrek Ivey crossed to our group. Ivey smashed it in the tailwind section at 10k to go, leaving the six of us with our pants down. All being tired after 80km on the front, we put on a lousy chase to no avail. Derrek won with Derrick and Jack taking the sprint for 2nd and 3rd, respectively.

I got worked over in the last lap, and in hindsight perhaps did a little too much work in the break. Cruised in for 7th place, but was overall happy to be in good enough form that I wasn’t just a wheel leech!

By Kevin Massicotte