stomping over the top

From the cyclingnews.com write up about the World Cup track event this last weekend in Los Angeles at the new, beautiful 250m indoor velodrome, the ADT Center:

With 27 women entered for the scratch race, two qualifying heats were held with the top 10 in each advancing to the final. With so many qualifying, there was little incentive to drive the pace and both heats more or less waited for the field sprint. Rebecca Quinn (USA) won the first heat and Alexis Rhodes (Australia) took out the slightly faster second heat. The energy saved in the heats would be unleashed in the final which was completed at an average speed that was 5 km/hr faster. Joanne Kiesanowski (New Zealand) and Elana Chalykh (Russia) were active throughout the race. The attacks were numerous but nobody got more than a half lap advantage over the field. The group was compact with five to go when Alexis Rhodes (Australia) hit the front and set tempo until inside of two to go when Mandy Poitras (Canada) came stomping over the top with teammate Gina Grain in tow. The leadout stalled as Yulia Arustamova (Russia) surged on the outside and gunned it all the way to the line for a win by several meters. Eleonora Soldo (Italy) grabbed the Silver while Emma Davies took Bronze to round out the podium.

I can just see Mandy flying over the heads of people leading Gina out. Why can I see this? Just like she's done so many times in the past on a Wednesday night or race weekend, she did it to me just two weeks ago at Burnaby. Just when you think it's safe to try and lead it out with three laps to go.... here she comes....



I'm glad to see Mandy out there kicking some ass, after her Silver Medal at Worlds last year and a couple of good World Cup performance this year, she's qualified to go to Worlds in March in LA. Top that off with being an 11 time Canadian National champion on the track and a wonderful person.

Three cheers for Mandy.