Yesterday was both our best day and our worst day. We lost four riders due to the time limit and at the same time we had a performances closer to what these riders are capable of.
Miguel Meza, Manuel Hernandez, Antonio Aldape and Florencio Ramos did not make the 10% time limit cut.
The four we lost have it in them to ride within the time limit in a race like this but they simply did not have the preperation and equipment. I understand from past performances like Miguel Meza has had by excellent performances in the Tour of Italy. Manuel Hernandez perticipated in the LA world cup race earlyer this year and it was a bit of a stretch for him to perform at such a high level in such two diferent venues especially considering the level here in the AMGEN Tour of California. Manuel will be off to Sydney next week. As for Antonio and Florencio they are quite disapointed but this is all part of moving to the next level. I am sure we can expect great performances from them in the future.
On the positive side Jesus Zarate 70th (9:24) yesterday has started to come into the race. He was climbing fine and finding some of his form. I know he is close to coming into his form it is just a matter of time before he moves into the high level. Jesus has good expereance and riders in the US may know him from his days when he was on the Mercury Team.
Domingo Gonzales had a rough day of it yesterday coming off at a particularly hard point. He made an incredible effort to make it in using his time trial ability. He made the cut by ten seconds!
Fausto Esparza was in the middle of the field today (68th)allong with Jesus. We will see today how many matches were burned. Fausto has done most of his racing in Centeral America but I think everyone who saw him with the Vuelta de Sonora last year was quite impressed!
Our standout performance was from Arquimides Lam. There was some good climbing yesterday and Lam showed that he is starting to come into some form. He topped out with two T Mobile guys and two Discovery Channel riders. The decent was fast and he was able to finish in the second group that was about 5:20 down.
Today will be the real test of this tour as there are the best equiped and fastest timetrialist in the world compeeting. Of course, this is going to be a great challenge especialy due to the time limit of 15% of the fastest time! In a race like this that might be five minutes. Thankfully the course does have some climbing in it but under the best conditions we would be more on par in the equipment arena. The distance is 17 mi. / 27.4 km. I am sure the guys will give it their full effort only time will tell if we will make it through this greatest of all our challenges this tour.
2 comments:
Dear jmdelaf,
I want to see these young riders!
Fausto has been good and the others have been making a great effort.
Selections are a big but so is equipment and staffing. The riders on this tour have been the least of my concerns.
Florencio was selected during a time when they are expecting a new child and some of the riders had little notice that they would be in the event.
Mexico has to start somewhere so this is it. I will be preparing a report to the voted members of the Mexican Federation with recommendations for further improvements.
Fabian,
Our equipment was of low quality and worn out. Lam was on a 10 kilo bike that had a worn out veloce shifter core and a bent strait rear derailleur. I had a set of climbing wheels for him borrowed from a friend here in Tucson.
Proper timeline notification for events like this is critical for the riders to be ready. The riders are left to their own preparations without any direction from someone who has experience in these types of events. Another aspect of this is that the riders do not know what to believe. Quite a few riders were surprised that we were actually going to compete due to low expectations of the Federations ability to deliver.
I was assured that the teams were going to equip their riders but it never happened. I brought seven sets of wheels… The equipment needs were specified by me months ago. Little delivery was made to cover our basic needs.
Thankfully, Mavic and Specialized were able to help but it is important to start out with the proper equipment to begin with. What passes as ok equipment in Mexico does not pass as competitive equipment in world level competition. Maxxis and Crank Brothers were also helping. KB HOME and AEG made this thing come together.
I was also told that we were going to have two good mechanics. No delivery here either. All of the tools that we used were mine I knew to get because I am responsible to deliver to the riders and KB Home our sponsor. The guys that were working on the bikes had no tools of their own and went through the learning curve of what needs to be done. Good people with no stage race experience. Not professional mechanics.
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