Mara Roldan (Cynisca Cycling) took out the opening stage of the 38th Redlands Bicycle Classic, winning the hilly Highlands Circuit in a group sprint.
The Canadian out-paced Maeghan Easler (DNA Pro Cycling) and Alia Shafi (Fount Cycling Guide) to claim the victory by a few bike lengths in the uphill sprint of the 39.2-mile race.
“We're always going for the win, but I surprised myself a little bit today, I struggled with some sickness coming today, so I was like a little bit anxious about my preparation, but we have a solid team,” Roldan said after the stage.
“We had a positive mindset and everyone really gave it everything. So, I'm really happy. I couldn't be more proud of the team today.”
One of the largest women’s pro fields in years for the women's stage race, more than 130 riders on 21 teams took the start under sunny skies and warm temperatures hovering around the 80°F mark. Attacks peppered the race but the field stayed together on the 14 laps of the 2.8-mile course.
Roldan and her team stayed safe and quiet in the field waiting for the final push to the line, and the expected accelerations which did not happen.
“I was quite surprised honestly because not a lot of people went hard on the second to last corner, I always expecting them to go really hard. They started to move down the descent.
"And then as we got into the chicane, Cara (O’Neill) came up, really positioned me well towards the front of the pack. We used some good communication and just towards the bottom here, she gave it everything to get me to the front and she said, go and I just went, I kind of used the other team's wheel a little bit and then just gave everything up the climb.”
The victory gives Roldan the first leader's jersey of the race, with a four-second lead on Easler, Shafi, who claimed two bonus seconds in the intermediate sprint, is in third place also four seconds in arrears.
Marlies Mejias (Virginia’s Blue Ridge-TWENTY24) is in fourth place in the general classification 12 seconds down with her teammate Emma Langley, in fifth place, one second behind. Langley also leads the mountains class.
Defending champion Emily Ehrlich (Virginia’s Blue Ridge-TWENTY24) arrived feeling ill, hoping to be able to race through Sunday. Though recent Pan American multi-gold medalist pulled out of the race within ten laps to go, she completed enough laps to be eligible for the start stage 2.
Racing continues on Thursday with an exciting new mountain climb for stage 2 at Onyx Summit, which had never been used as the finish for a pro bike race. The long ascent covers 33 miles with an average gradient of 3.9% before the summit finish crests at an elevation of 8,443 feet (2,573m). Beginning in San Bernardino, the women will tackle 40 miles with two QOM locations on Trek Onyx Summit Road Race.
“I think it's gonna be interesting with that big climb [on stage 2], but we have a lot of competition this year and I'm excited to see where it mixes up and good luck to everybody out there,” Shafi commented.
Results
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