US Championships! Some big names of cycling will fight for glory, kicking off with a sprinters-friendly parcours around Chattanooga. Some difficulties in the first half, but a flat finish-circuit are likely to suit either the sprinters or roleurs.
(*due to some issues with the startlist regarding 9-men-squads, Heineken was/is missing one rider (Weiss). We noticed that afterwards, made some testing and the gameplay remained the same. That's why we kept it that way. For further infos (or anger) PM me!)
Biggest name at the start is David Zabriskie (ING), who's obviously aiming for the TT-title - which should be possible with new TT-World Champion (and maybe even bigger name) Phinney having to skip the National TT competition.
As for the road race, well known sprinters like Holloway (Pokerstars), Farrar/Keough (AMEX) or roleurs like Phinney (Wikipedia) will fancy their chances.
The pressure is also on three teams (Heineken/8 riders, Wikipedia/7 and AMEX/5), which bring almost full line-ups here. It's up to them to control the race.
5 riders went clear early in the race and it's some well known names in here:
Dombrowski (WWE)
Talansky (Wikipedia)
Craddock (Mobil-Castrol)
Lewis (MTN)
Peterson (Heineken)
Plus it's rather bad news for AMEX, as the two PT-teams with the biggest line-ups managed to get a rider in this breakaway!
And so it may not be too surprising that it's the so often to be seen succesfull breakaway in those Nationals.. the group leads by 10 minutes 14km before finish - the bunch behind is done.
Talansky is the first in this group trying to escape now!
It ain't looking bad for the climber - he holds on to a 23"-gap with now 3.5km remaining! His former breakaway companions work well together though.
In the meantime, two riders (Van Garderen/Eastman) attacked the peloton, but it's way too late to come even close to this leading five..
Here they come down the short finishing stretch and Talansky is still n the leading position with the gap getting smaller..
Lewis, Dombrowski and Craddock are well within reach, while Peterson couldn't hang on in this sprint.
Also Craddock can't follow anymore and so it's three riders almost head-to-head with the line approaching:
Talansky, Dombrowski or Lewis - who's going to be the new US road champ?
It's the upcoming star Joseph Dombrowski (WWE)! Thanks to a great finishing speed, the young gun takes out the US Road Champs ahead of Lewis and Talansky.
That's yet another reason for many managers to keep an (or two) eye(s) on Joe, who will enter the transfer season as a free agent "thanks" to his team WWE disbanding after this season.
US Championships! Some big names of cycling will fight for glory, kicking off with a sprinters-friendly parcours around Chattanooga. Some difficulties in the first half, but a flat finish-circuit are likely to suit either the sprinters or roleurs. 
