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And Flagpole Helps You Figure It All Out
N ow staring down its third decade of
competition, the Athens Twilfght
Criterium has matured into one
of the jewels of American cycling
over the past 29 years. Fast, tough and seen
by tens of thousands of spectators every year,
Twilight has grown into a festival-sized cel
ebration that encompasses sports, music and a
modern, healthy living lifestyle expo.
Covering 80 kilometers (40 kilometers
for women), riders approach heart-straining
speeds as they spin lap after lap around
downtown Athens, dodging uneven pavement
and the sharp elbows of their competitors
while engulfed in a wall of sound created by
enthusiastic spectators around the rectangular
course. If you've never witnessed the event
live, it's a must-see, whether you care one
whit about bike racing or not. The handcycle
criterium (always worth seeing) is scheduled
to start at 6:30 p.m. on Saturday night, the
Women's Pro race at 7:45 p.m. and the Men's
Pro race at 8:45 p.m.—and those times could
be pushed back—but both Friday and Saturday
are full of Twilight events all day long (one
notable example: the BMX contest runs from
11 a.m.-3:30 p m. Saturday, downtown on
College Avenue), and the full updated sched
ule is online at www.athenstwilight.com.
Athens is home to several pro riders and
four cycling teams, and Twilight is a big day
on their race calendar. Our local squads always
hope to do well here, but the tremendous
amount of heat that shows up for this now
classic event is so top-shelf that nabbing a
hometown win is tricky to say the least.
Elite cycling coach and veteran
announcer Chad Andrews has called the
Athens Twilight Criterium for the past five
years, and as a result, has witnessed some
of the very best of this unique form of
American racing up close. While the Pro
Men's field will start with over 100 riders,
fewer than two thirds will probably finish.
Of the remaining riders, only a handful of
heavy hitters will have the fitness, skill and
full support of their teammates to be in
contention for the final sprint to the line.
Then again, last year's men's and women's
winners, Mark Hekman and Katherine
Carroll, would have been dark horses at
best. Andrews says these are some men to
watch this year. [JoE Silva]
FRANK TRAVIESO (Toshiba-Santo): "He
literally looks like he's riding with wings.
He looks lean, confident and comfortable...
and just fast."
JEFF HOPKINS (Abercrombie & Fitch/
Inferno Racing): "Jeff is an opportunist. If
he can survive the first 20 laps, I think he's
got as decent a shot as anyone to be in the
finish. The people that always beat him,
except for Frank, won't be there."
MARTIN GILBERT (Kelly Benefits-
Medifast): "If he starts this season like
he finished last season, forget it... he's
a factor. The guy not only has a great
sprint, but he has a great finish. With three
JITTERY JOE’S: Probably the best-known
local team, Jittery Joe's is run by Micah Rice
and his Directeur Sportif Jesse Lawler. For
years the team looked to their fast man, Jeff
"Lightning" Hopkins to snag a hometown
victory, but it has so far eluded them. With
Hopkins gone and this year's Tour de Georgia
running concurrently with Twilight, Rice will
kilometers to go, he really fights well for
the front. And that's very important at a
race like Athens, because those last five
laps are absolute mayhem."
EMILE ABRAHAM (Team Type 1): "Emile
usually excels at some of the late season
stuff. But the fact that he already did well
at the San Dimas Stage Race, where the
talent level is significantly higher, puts
him somewhere around a 7 to 1 chance of
winning."
JOHN MURPHY (Health Net): "He's rid
ing awesome, but does the time on the
bike he's put in this year come back to bite
him? He won the Tour of Taiwan; he raced
in California and in some of the Georgia
Cup races. Has he been taking the time off
to be ready to race in Athens?"
KYLE WAMSLEY (Colavita-Sutter Home):
"Super strong, and he doesn't necessar-.
ily need many teammates to be successful
here."
CHAD HARTLEY (Jittery Joe's): "He's
young, but his experience of having done
this race before may help him get through
the first 15 laps. If you're going to have
success at Twilight, you need to have
raced it before. This is monkey junk... put
it through the windmill, into the gorilla's
mouth and hope that it goes in the hole.
It's too frenetic."
be fielding only three riders here this year.
But he remains confident that they remain
players for the overall winnings. Gone also
are the Jittery Joe's Mini Coopers that many
a journalist crammed into while covering the
team. (Augusta's Taylor BMW now sponsors
the team's more spacious rides.) The team has
added a bit of semi-camouflage green to its
uniforms for added flair, but there's no com
ment on whether the team's caffeine-based
sponsor gives them an unfair advantage.
"The difference for us this year is that
we've got a really core group of guys that we
can count on," Rice says. "We've got Chad
Hartley who's a very good sprinter and a
proven criterium rider. We're also bringing Tim
Henry and Ben Kneller, who is a super crazy
strong kid. It's a smaller squad then we'd
like to field, but with Tour of Georgia on the
same weekend, we kind of had to move stuff
around. We kind of made our decision about
who is doing Georgia by making sure we had
a strong team for doing Twilight. Even though
it's only three guys, I think we can get in
there and scrap it out."
www.thebeanteam.com
TOSHIBA-SANTO: The Toshiba-Santo
Professional Cycling Team presented by
Herbalife is one of the best criterium teams
in the U.S. The outfit stands a more than sig
nificant chance at winning the 29th edition
of the Twilight Criterium. The team currently
counts the under-23 national criterium cham
pion (Keith Norris), last year's USA CRITS over
all series winner Frank Travieso and the 2007
Athens Twilight Champion Mark Hekman.
Team director Gus Carrillo sums up the race
this way: "I haven't really seen the odds, so •
to speak, so I can't really say that we're the
odds-on favorite. I think that once the expe
rienced people that watch racing here in the
U.S. see our roster, they're going to see that
we're definitely going for the win. We're not
scared of anybody with that roster of eight
guys. The pressure will be on us a little bit to
do a lot of work, but we look forward to it.
That's what we have to do to win bike races."
The young man who will be feeling the
majority of that pressure, Frank Travieso, is
resigned to do everything he can to deliver
the win. "Twilight with me is a big fight.
Every year I come to Twilight I come with my
best form, and I can never get into the top
10. This year I want to win. But if one of my
teammates goes in the breakaway and laps the
field, I will work pretty hard for him. For sure,
one of us is looking to win."
www.toshibacycling.com
AARON’S: Micah Rice also happens to head
up the Aaron's Pro Women's Cycling team,
and last year they produced the winner of the
Athens Twilight Criterium, Katherine Carroll.
Carroll's carter on two wheels ever since has
taken a considerable upswing; as a result,
she will not be returning to Athens to defend
her title because of her racing schedule in
Europe. Nevertheless, Aaron's should not be
discounted in 2008, according to Rice.
"We're bringing a strong team of six,
including some of our best sprinters," he says.
"Our new sprinters... Anna Lang was third at
the (National Criterium Championship race at]
Downer's Grove this year, and Erica Allar is
the under-23 national criterium champion two
years running. So we have some strong crit
riders here for sure and a good support like
Rebecca Larson, who is an Athens resident and
the collegiate national champion two years in
a row."
www.aaronscyclingteam.com
LOCOS GRILL 8c PUB: Locos Grill & Pub
Elite Cycling Team is a squad of local elite
amateurs who often use the team as a spring-
hoad to bigger programs. But lately, Locos
^showing some real muscle on the criterium
circuit, particularly in the form of one Chris
Scott.
"Chris is riding better than he ever has,"
says team director Micah Morlock. "These guys
are in it looking for high places and to get in
the moves. Their sprinting skills are good if
they can get in the break. One of our foremost
goals is to be a development team for people
who want to get into professional cycling, but
it's also a place for Athens' elite riders to have
a home."
http://teamblingbling.com
12 FLAGPOLE.COM APRIL 23,2008
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