State Crit

Here are some photos from the state Crit on 5/25. MOB had a good day with the top result being Daryl Rains in the 45+ race in 2nd. And Chip Duckett beat the shit out of that tree he got into it with.

Dragon Challenge TT

Dragon Challenge TT
Good day for MOB at the Dragon Challenge TT. Traditionally this event has been an ominum with a road race, TT and then hosting the NC State Crit Championship on Memorial Monday. This year there was no road race but the promoters did an excellently job at putting the best 2 out of three with the TT being today Sunday in Wade and the NC Crit Championships tomorrow in Fayettville.
Today we had Pete Cannell in the Cat 1, 2 field, Daryl Rains in the Cat. 3 field Rick Lee in the Cat. 4 field and myself in the 35+ 1,2,3 field.
Pete set the bench mark for the day posting a time of 43:54 for the 22 mile course with Ryan Jenkins in second with a time 0f 44:54 for 1st and 2nd in the Cat 1,2 field.
Daryl came in from a weekend at the beach to take first place in the Cat. 3 field posting an impressive time of 48:44. While new dad Rick Lee finished 6th in the Cat. 4 field of 54:01 while setting a PR for himself in the first 10miles. I on the other hand ran into some difficulty locating the course by taking a wrong turn at a detour for raod constrution. I arrived at 10:53 am for a scheduled 11:02am start time. I can still hear the announcer calling my name to the line while frantically trying to get my wheels on. So with zero warm up I was able to post a time of 49:00 for 3rd in the 35+ 1,2,3 behind 1st place Ryan Jenkins , who did two laps and on the second was with a flat front tire, and big Kurt Massey was second. A really strong performace by Team MOB toady and look forward to some solid result from the team tomorrow.

MOB at Tour De Lions

The rain held off for the most part of the Tour De Lions ride down in Gray's Chaple. This was the 10th year that Fred Lineberry has hosted this event that is so well supported by the community. There were over 380 riders that took part in the various distances from 10mile to 75miles. This year we started at the new Providence High School which served to be a better venue than in previous years at the church. The one thing that did not change was the great support by the whole community, good traffic control and then the best brownies any where.
MOB was well represented with more than I can call out but we had Paul and Julie Paisant, Rich Melenico, Steve Brumbley, Ken Gulledge, Frank Mullins and others.
All of us took on the challenging 75 mile loop. Once we were established out on Hwy 22 we were rolling. Frank really put in two solid efforts of about 15mins each which keep the pace up but also the ride safe. For the first 2 hrs we had an avg. of 25mph which in turn whittled our group down to 6 which included Steven, Rich, Monty Stout of Velo Project two others and my self. 10 miles from the finish we turned onto Providence Church Rd which has a series of these rolling hills that are great to put in a hard effort. After taking a pull I rotated to the back, recovered a bit and gave it a go. I wanted to see if Monty would go with me but I was solo. Now the group is 5 with two team mates. So it is simple just put the head down, try to stay out of sight and not go so hard as to lock up. With the help of Steven and Rich I was able to stay away for a soild effort.
Shortly after Steven, Rich and I finished Paul was in with a solid ride as well as Julie on her new Look 595. Ken was in with a good avg. as well. All in all alot of fun, good food and a wonderful day on the bike. Rodney

Spinz for Hope

MOB had two opportunities to fly the colors today with the Lewisville Metric and Spinz for Hope taking place on the same Sat. We had representation at Spinz for Hope with Mark Jellous, Rick Lee (recent dad of twins) , Steve Golinski (who just ran the NC Marathon last weekend), Kenny "G" Gulledge, Grant Lawyer and myself rolled out for some hill work in rolling Randolph Co.
Sandy Endinburger, ride promoter, really did a great job organizing the event that provides funding for Caner Research. The support and traffic control were great.
Things pretty much rolled along til we hit the foot of Caraway. Thanks to the lead out by Steve and then Rick I towed the line til just past the conference center enterance. Mark then hit it pulling out John Fender of Carolina Masters, Wyatt Brings of Piedmont Velo, Grant and myself. The 5 of us were able to cont. til we hit Jerechio Rd. This piece of pavement is nothing but some good old Randolph Co. terrain that is just as much up as it is down. Mark put in repeated attacks til Grant and I said "I 'm done" while I heard the kid Wyatt just grimance. Grant and I took turns rotating at a steady pace to the end of Jericho and then onto Earnhardt Rd. Again more of the same Up then down then up again til we saw the three coming back. We were within 10sec of the lead 3 when of course Mark light it up on the wall on Earnhardt while Wyatt and John turned themselves inside to no avail. Mark was gone for the remainder of the ride. Grant and I are now with John and Wyatt with Mark up the road but still insight on Hoover Hill Rd. It is call Hoover Hill for a reason.
John put in two attacks on our group but he was not able to get away. I knew as we turned on to Kenndey Rd. was going to be a blast til Finch Farm especially since we were now joined by Monty Stout another Piedmont Velo rider. Pretty much we agreed to roll in together which we did. All in all a good day on the bike with some good efforts for a good cause. Now, lets hear the rest of the story from Lewisville. Thanks for the support. Rodney

Dilworth to Ducktown

I had been looking forward to racing in the Dilworth Criterium for a couple of weeks now as it was my first race ever last year. The 3/4 field was very large, it was just myself and Chip representing MOB in the field. Chip had just raced the Masters 45+ with Kelly and Daryl who made the break and finished a strong 3rd and 5th. Chip told me on the way to the line that he would help me all he could, I needed help but there was nothing he could do for me. We rolled up to the line at the back of the field which is, as you all know, not a good thing in a large field. When the race started I had trouble getting clipped as I was avoiding a guy in front of me struggling getting clipped in. I started off in the hole and made it back to the field in the bottleneck going into the fourth turn but it was all bad from there, I ended up dropping off the back with a few others, got lapped and retired, I'm not sure how Chip finished. Enough of that... on a positive note I did hear Sirena, Rip and Theresa tore up the field in the womens race! Good job ladies! Curious to find out how the rest of the team did in their respective races.

My good friend and coach had called me on Thursday and told me he was racing in Ducktown, TN at the Kenda US Cup and invited me to come along and bring my mountain bike. I'd never been to a mountain bike race let alone raced in one, I was hesitant but thought I would give it a shot. My son and I left directly from Dilworth and made the 4 1/2 hour trek to Ducktown hoping to arrive in time to pre-ride the course but didn't make it in time. It rained the entire time we were there and the 11 mile course was shortened to 8 miles for fear of tearing up the trials. My race went off at 11:30, Geoff gave me some pointers about the course before rolling off, he had raced and dominated the Single Speed class earlier in the morning. They had a motorcycle pace the field of 14 to the start of the climb, I got the wheel of the motorcycle on the start and after he pulled off I put the hammer down and didn't look back until about halfway up the climb and there was no one in sight. I continued to push hard through the rain, mud and down a super fast and slick descent, I won the race and put the MOB kit on the top step of the podium. Sweet!