Kjellquist Blog

Well, the 3rd Tour of Ephrata is in the bag. Three races in 2 days run as true stage race (you have to ride and finish all stages) with top 20 point scoring (not total time).
But first a little about Ephrata. Ephrata is a small but very vibrant town in the heart of Lancaster County, PA. For the past 3 years the town has really embraced this race staged by Red Rose Races and the promoter Rich Ruoff. Rich has been able to close Main St. for several hours on Sunday and run a very will organized and well attended criterium climax to the weekend of racing. In the first couple of years I’m not certain the townspeople knew what to make of the racers speeding around corners approaching 30 mph but each year the crowds seem to be larger. Fortunately, Rich seems to have an “in” with the weather gods and sunny skies usually prevail.
The Tour this year started with the normal Farmersville Road Race on Saturday. This very popular road race (my 4th year) has excellent facilities and good rolling country roads. The course not a challenging one overall so tactics are more in play. In my race (50+/ 60+ category) the yellow line was STRICTLY enforced resulting in a different race this year. With almost 50 riders on a narrow country lane, moving forward in the peloton was a real challenge. The only real opportunities came when the field headed into a cross wind and bunched to the side. Then, if you were adventurous, you could stick your nose into the wind and move up with some effort. This is what I did near the end of lap 2. Once at the front, I just kept going, dragging on rider with me, and bridging up to Bill Care. Into the wind this effort was just to much for me. We were shortly caught. I slipped to back of the field. I hung on for another few miles but eventually lost contact on the second have of lap 3. I finished lap 4 solo being the last rider to be pulled do to time limitations on the road closures (we were the last race of the day). I was 35th place after this stage.