Good, Better, Baestaens at Charm City Day 1
Baestaens continues his run of success, Hyde and Werner go down to the wire
Last weekend, Vincent Baestaens kicked off his American trip with two wins at Rochester Cyclocross obtained two different ways. On Saturday, he attacked mid-race and went solo to take the victory. Then on Sunday, he sat in for most of the race before making a winning move on Stephen Hyde in the closing corners of the race.
This weekend at Charm City Cross in Baltimore, Baestaens entered with a lot of confidence, but he also had to contend with the much-hyped cyclocross return of Christopher Blevins. And while Blevins admitted he was rusty on the ‘cross bike coming in, he has had a lot of success in the last month and was a rider everyone—fans and riders alike—had their eyes on.
“Blevins being there, everybody knows what he's capable of. Everything was expecting something spectacular to happen,” Kerry Werner said after the race.
Vincent was good and better in Rochester, but he’d have the be the Baestaens on Saturday to continue his winning streak.
A Charm City Group Ride
Kerry Werner got Saturday’s Elite Men’s C1 started by taking the holeshot and leading the field out onto the course at Druid Hill Park.
There was an unfortunate casualty from the get-go, as Curtis White continued his run of bad luck when his chain snapped a few pedal strokes into the race. He had to kick-push his way to the pit while dropping to DFL in the nearly 70-rider strong field.
Without White at the front, several riders took up pacemaking in the first lap. First up was Michael van den Ham, who put in work at the front for the first half of the lap. Little separation happened on the twisty course, and a large group of riders formed at the front.
“This race always has a group. It's always been that way,” Stephen Hyde said. “There's not a really decisive feature. There's nothing overly technical. It's broken up a lot. There's not a whole lot of pedaling, and the pedaling that is there really isn't hard or long enough to break anything up. That's just how it goes.”
One lap into the race, the lead group was a full 15 riders. Christopher Blevins was among those riders after making a big push forward from the 50th call-up position.
In the 2nd Lap of the 9-lap race, riders traded turns at the front, as the group stayed above 10 riders within shouting distance of the front of the race.
In the 3rd lap, Kerry Werner started to assert himself at the front.
Werner and Van den Ham briefly got a small gap on the field in that third lap, but the long climb up to the off-camber at the far side of the course erased their brief effort off the front.
In the 4th lap, the lead group was still 11 riders. That large group would only last so long, however. After the barriers, riders faced a section that was more or less a climb all the way to the off-camber at the far side of the course.
After sitting in for the opening laps, Baestaens wanted to open things up, and he felt that long climb was the perfect place to do it. “I thought that would be a difficult part for the others because if you push from the beginning it's one long effort to the off-camber. Then you can recover a little bit,” the Belgian said.
Baestaens’ move earned him a gap after Van den Ham snapped a spoke and Hecht was unable to keep the pace.
“He went at the very bottom of the course,” Werner explained. “That straight had the most climbing and pedaling. He went, and Van den Ham and Gage were on his wheel to shut it down, but Van den Ham had a mechanical, and Gage wasn't super keen on shutting it down. I tried to come around Gage before the off-camber, but I couldn't. Then Vinnie had a bit more than I did, and I just couldn't make it happen. Then we kind of regrouped.”
Just as he did at Rochester on Day 1, Baestaens quickly opened up a solo gap.
The race for the win belonged to Baestaens the rest of the way, although he kept one eye on the Americans racing behind him. “I managed to make the gap a little bit better. Then I was always looking to see where they were, and if they were coming closer, I would up my speed.”
Things did get a little dicey for Baestaens at the end of the last lap, as he was trying to save some energy for Sunday while the Americans started really racing for that second podium spot. As such, the final margin of 3 seconds does not do justice to Baestaens’ dominant win against a large gaggle of riders.
“I tried to save some energy at the end of the race, but of course, they were racing for spots too. I had to push again a little bit at the end. I was getting a little bit nervous, but I kept focusing on not making any mistakes,” he explained.
Hyde spoke highly about the Belgian cyclocross visitor after the race. “Vinnie played exactly like he should have done. He's on good form. He's smart. He's been around for a really long time. He's a really smart racer. I think he's perpetually just off that top 10, top 5 form in Belgium, and that's just where we fight for.”
Down to the Wire for Second
Once Baestaens went free, the chasing group was down to Hyde, Werner, Hecht, Blevins, Scott McGill, and Dutch privateer Gosse van der Meer. After sporting a beard in the first few races of his American trip, Van der Meer’s signature ‘stache … was BACK, most likely giving him the powers he needed to compete for the podium.
For nearly four full laps, the chase group of seven stuck together, with no one really getting an advantage on the rest of the bunch.
Coming down to the final lap, things started to heat up. After sitting in and riding the flow of the group, he was getting ready to exert himself in that final lap.
“I think it made everyone nervous,” Hyde said about those four laps. “You let gaps go up in the, let's call them the squiggly bits, but then you kind of rolled back on in the start straight. It was a stressful, nerve-wracking situation, but if you know how to play it, you know how to play it.”
Once on the front near the end of the penultimate lap, Hyde started to really up the tempo. He exploded up the last lap’s opening climb and kept on the gas heading to the flyover. “I tried to lead that last lap because there aren't many places to put power down,” Hyde explained. “I wanted to make sure that where I could, I did. I started hopping the barriers, which saved me a little bit of energy, but it didn't seem to matter much.”
Hyde’s action at the front finally cracked the group open. He accelerated up the long stretch up to the off-camber—the same one where Baestaens attacked earlier—and only Kerry Werner could follow him. Just like last Saturday at Rochester, it was down to Hyde and Werner for 2nd place.
With Hyde in the lead, Werner made his first play for the lead. “Coming out of Pit 2, I tried to make a move on him. There wasn't enough room to do it, and he put me into the tape,” Werner explained.
As the last of the squiggly bits wound down, Werner was running out of options. Right before the final flyover onto the finishing straight, there was a sweeping off-camber into a few hairpins. Werner went for it on that sweeping turn.
“He knew I was there, so I acted like I was coming inside, so he shut me down inside and swung out to hit that corner, and I pipped him on that inside and took him to the tape,” Werner said.
Hyde could tip his cap and call Werner his daddy on this afternoon. “Going into the last sweeping off-camber, he just dove on the inside of me. Honestly, he ripped it really well. Watching it, I was like, 'He's definitely going to crash. Then nope, nope, that was it. That was good.’”
Werner completed the sprint to hold onto 2nd place and beat out Hyde for 2nd for the 2nd time in three races. Despite getting second, Werner said he has been enjoying these battles against Hyde.
“I think it's dad watts coming out first-year fatherhood, and I think it's treated him pretty well,” Werner said. “He just has a high level of experience, so right when you think you've got him figured out, you don't. You always have to stay on your toes, and he's been riding really strong the last three weekends. It's a long season, I'm sure we'll have a bunch more battles.”
Blevins finished 4th, and Scott McGill turned in the best performance of his season—and kind of rode out of his mind to get there—and took home 5th place.
The Elite Men return to action for Sunday’s C2 after the warm, dusty afternoon of racing.
High hopes for Blevins for Sunday