Tour of Utah, America's greatest race behind the Amgen and USAPCC.
Expectations are pretty high after finishing 10th in California but my form
is dropping fast and I'm a little flustered by what happened after I left China.

August 6-11, 2017 : Tour of Utah



Some high profile riders have done well here in the past.
I'm hoping I can add my name to that exclusive list.



The start list isn't too crowded but some interesting teams here.
Santander makes the trip, but not Fernando Alonso. He stayed in .
While Air Canada brings a squad half-full of Frenchmen!

What were they thinking? This can't go over well with the spectators
with the war between and just being declared.



Meanwhile Fox has it's own little war brewing for who is going to lead the team.
Craddock, Warbasse, or me? We don't know. DS just told us to figure it out.
This isn't going to end well for us either I'm afraid...

Should make for an interesting race though. Here we go!

--- *** --- *** --- *** ---



Flat, but a little climbing. The downhill into the finish will make this stage tricky.



Breakaway of 2 to start the day. Alonso must have told his team to be active.



But, it was always going to be a sprinter's stage.
There is Alonso's Santander team right in the mix once again.



Not fast enough. The first battle in the America Vs. French War goes to...
France as Romain Feillu out-sprints René Mandri on American soil.

As you can guess the few spectators that showed up today aren't happy at all.
Rumor has it that the people of Utah are going to boycott the rest of the stages.

The few spectators that showed up on stage 1 have completely vanished.
A Frenchmen winning was the boiling point, literally no one is here.



Future American great Paul Evans gets into the morning breakaway.



The breakaway crumbles apart on the cat. 2 climb before the finish.



That report is heard over the race radio and Craddock goes on the attack!



He joins the lone breakaway man left with 10kms to go.



However, he then gets caught with 6kms to go.
Is it wrong that I'm happy he got caught and didn't win?



We go to the sprint. Where somehow Craddock still has the energy left to sprint.
He is such a weird dude. His unpredictability makes it hard to race with him.



René Mandri gets his revenge for finishing 2nd on stage 1 with a win here.
Craddock manages a 7th place as I rested for the big stage tomorrow.

Best odds are on Joseph Dombrowski at 2:1. My odds... 13:1.



Breakaway of 3 brings us to the climb of the hour.



Weird stuff happening in the peloton in the early slopes of the climb.
Craddock sets the pace for a little bit and surprisingly opened up a gap.

But, he got pulled back quickly so Warbasse, Evans, and I try the same thing.
Again a very small gap opens up for us as well. Can we take advantage?



It's working. Evans can't keep up but Warbasse and I are up to the breakaway.



Warbasse protected me up the climb and then tells me to go for it at the top.



I hope all this downhill training pays off. Don't look back.
I'm hearing over the race radio that the peloton has blown up.
There are small groups all over the road trying to chase me down.



5kms to go and I can't help it. I look back.
I can only see Warbasse struggling in the distance!



Unbelievable. Umm... Yeah... I don't know what to say... The banner!



I WWWWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!
There are no fans here to celebrate with me, but a win is win!



Perhaps the most tactical and best climb I have every rode in my career.
A very big shout-out to Larry Warbasse for pacing me up the climb.
He gets a well deserved 2nd place for his efforts in helping me.

Now the questions at hand are...


I guess we will found out tomorrow.

SPOILER ALERT: Read the report to figure out the abundance of points.

The next race update will be the final 3 Stages of the Tour of Utah:

EXP - Downhill (x2), Acceleration / Form - Mountain (x3), Hill