Penn State edges home team UPenn for Phlyer Win

By Charlie Zamastil

Penn State University used its depth to edge out overall Divison 1 leader University of Pennsylvania for top honors this weekend at the 2010 Philly Phlyer. Penn State and UPenn co-hosted the event and dominated it. When the points were tallied, Penn State scored no fewer than 30 in every race category, to better UPenn 212 to 188. Rounding out the podium with 164 points was the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Saturday

After pedaling through apocalyptic conditions in New York the previous weekend, the ECCC racers welcomed a brisk morning that gave way to sunny skies and 70-plus degree temperatures for Saturday’s team time trial and circuit race. Both the team time trial and the circuit race included a serpentine trek through narrow roads, including a long, flat, and fast stretch along the Schuylkill River in Philadelphia’s Fairmount Park, and finished after a tight roundabout atop a short but steep 9 percent quarter mile climb. Regarding the races’ tight, technical nature, one men’s A racer asked, “who designed this course, Jackson Pollack? Still, I think the designer (co-promoter Drexel Unviersity’s Timothy Manzella) made the race safer by making it harder.”

The 6.2-mile TTT’s fastest time belonged to current Division 1 leader UPenn, whose men’s A team put more than 20 seconds into its nearest competitor’s, while just under 2 seconds separated second place Pittsburgh, third place Temple, and fourth place Vermont. In the female categories, the day belonged to MIT, with Yale just 11 seconds in arrears. The women’s B, C, and intro winners were Rutgers, Yale, and University of Vermont. Penn State claimed both the men’s B and C titles, edging out Delaware in B’s and Delaware in C’s, while Northeastern took the D crown and Yale the intro.

The circuit race belonged to breakaways. In most races, the climbers used the repeated journeys up the short, steep finishing hill to establish a selection in every race. In the women’s A race, overall leader Anna McLoon and sprint points leader Martha Buckley demonstrated just why they held the premier ECCC positions, quickly gapping everyone else, leaving the peloton to battle for third. Working together until the very end, McLoon edged Buckley by half a wheel to take top honors. Racing with the A’s, the B winner, Columbia’s Aimee Layton, came around the roundabout well positioned with several A riders between her and second-placed Stefanie Sydlik, and took top honors.

Remaining together until final hill, the women’s C field was led home by Susannah Hufstader of Colby College, with Drexel’s Victoria Hanks hot on her heals. In the intro race, Vermont’s Shannon Burke demonstrated she was ready for an upgrade, easily gapping her competitors up Black Road, and holding on for the victory.

In the men’s A race, Princeton showed that in spite of the loss of last year’s D-II national champion Nick Frey, they are no worse for the wear. Perennial powerhouses Austin Roach and Nick Bennette, who both ride for the MetLife elite team, dominated the race. Roach broke solo within the first five miles with Bennette covering all attempts to reel him in. Solo bridge attempts abounded, but Roach simply rode each successful bridge off his wheel until current ECCC leader Max Korus (UPenn) added a major engine to the move.

Recognizing the threat these diesels posed, several riders laid down the hammer, bridging to the break, meanwhile splitting the peloton. Eventually a front group of 16 came into the finishing drag race just prior to the hill. Roach expertly brought Bennette into position, where he was able to just barely hold off the hard charging trio of Korus and his UPenn teammate Sean Whiteman, along with Lee Peters of UVM, who collectively have scored 75 percent of the available points in the ECCC competition.

After the race, Bennette remarked, “As summer teammates on the MetLife cycling team, Austin knew exactly what he had to do to deliver me to the finish for the sprint out of our select group. I was pretty toast, but managed to capitalize on his gargantuan efforts.”

The men’s B, C1, C2, D1, D2, and intro race all finished in similar fashion, with the winners emerging from the top sprinters out of a small selection. Respectively, they were Cole Archambault of Tufts, Andrew Haughton of Penn State, Pat Dunn of Rennselaer Polytechnic Institute, Nicholas Calcagni of Drexel, Andrew Haggerty of Millersville, and Torey Miller of Rochester Institute of Technology.

Sunday

Weather mirroring Saturday’s greeted riders at the Naval Yards in South Philadelphia. The highly technical six-corner, 1.2-kilometer crit took its toll on all, as crashes, breaks, and dropped riders abounded.

Given that each of the previous 11 races in the men’s A category were won by a sprint out of a small breakaway, the men wasted no time, as all 53 starters clamored for position in the opening laps. Riders were popping left and right as the pace remained high enough to keep the field single file for the opening 15 minutes.

No break was given any sort of leash, and at the end of the race, the 29 remaining riders were left to sprint for it. Despite having been on the front chasing every threat, the indefatigable overall leader Max Korus was third wheel going into the final lap. He pulled into the lead coming out of turn 5, drilled it around turn 6, and just managed to hold off his hard-charging nearest rival for the ECCC overall, Lee Peters of UVM. On his omnipresence at the front of the race, Korus shrugged and said, “sitting in didn’t really seem like an option.” With the win, Korus was able to expand his lead in the ECCC overall competition; this being his first year as a cat A, perhaps he has a future in this bike racing thing.

The men’s B race was dominated by a group of 14, led home by Penn State’s dynamic Frenchman Arnaud Borner. The C1 race was captured by UPenn’s Goran Lynch, thanks in large part to a great leadout from teammates James Heany and John Farrell, who managed to hold on for fourth and fifth.

Princeton’s time trial phenom Aaron Horvath lit up the C2 race, but in the end the sprint power of the Franklin & Marshall trio of Charles Salzar, Stephen Thomasch, and Andrew Mitsifer was too great, as the F&M trio swept the podium. Northeastern went 1-2 in the D1 race with Michael Farrar and Dominic Ciazzo, while Zachary Ybarra edged James Wolf of F&M in the D2. The intro race saw Alexander Reich use his cornering expertise to distance Rochester’s Torey Miller.

The women’s racing left all wondering what they put in the water in Boston, as MIT’s Buckley took top honors in the A race ahead of teammate Yuri Matsumoto and Harvards Eun Young Choi, while the B race was captured by Boston University’s Kimberly Zubris, with Northeastern’s Katy Applin close behind. Yale’s Amelia Siani broke Boston’s stranglehold atop the podium in the C race, though Ashley Hopwood of Northeastern gave Beantown its third win of the day.

Charlie Zamastil is a graduate student at Temple University and a member of the school’s cycling team.

FILED UNDER: Collegiate / News / Race Report / Road