The Tour de White Rock road race takes place as the last and most likely the hardest of the BC Super week races. 130 kilometres up and down the steep and technical streets of White Rock B.C with a fast field, this was sure to be a hard race.
Our goal for the race was to use the attrition of the race to thin out the field and then try for a late attack. There was lots of attacks during the race that Clarke, Al, and I were covering, but none of those were going anywhere. After a little while there was a group that got up the road without any of us in it which made me a bit unhappy to be honest, but it’s a hard race and a lot can change later.
As the field got smaller and smaller entering the short laps of the race, I started to see riders of the breakaway get gobbled up by the peloton, one by one the chances for a top 10 finish were improving. Now I know the finish well of the race so I knew where and when I needed to be in position. The last time up the climb a rider from Garneau Quebecor attacked and a Silber Rider, Florenz Knauer, and I followed the move and got a big gap on the rest of the field. 6th through 9th place overall was up for grabs from this group. I looked at the power file from the attack later that day and it said I did 1000 watts for 15 seconds on the climb, plus an effort before and after that attack which was late in the race as we know.
Out of the guys that I broke away with I finished 9th overall in the race (they all beat me in the sprint to the line). This was my best result in any race during this week, if not in the year so far. The White Rock RR is said to be one of the hardest races in Canada, and the field is a very strong one. I was happy to finish where I did, someday I know that I can win this race and its one of my biggest goals to accomplish that… just got to keep chipping away at it.