Back in Canada

Home and Nationals 2017

It’s June, and that means Canadian road nationals. I have had great days at nationals, but so far in the under 23 catagory, I have had no such luck. This will be my third attempt at the elite/U23 title, and with the course being in Ottawa again it will be a bit of a lottery as to who can make the lead group on the pan flat course.

First up though is the Riverport road race, the one race in NS that usually fits around my full European calendar. I like to try and do at least one race while I am home, I always try to put on a show as well and let the younger guys see how they compare. When I was just starting I would always watch my role models like Garrett M and Andrew L to see what they do so I could learn. It’s always fun to approach a race like that and really just try crazy stuff.

Nationals was not a big target for me this year so I took an opportunity to make a bit of a training camp out of it before the big European summer trip. I stayed with my teammate Derek G and we were training a lot in the amazing Gatineau park, one of my favourite places to ride. Derek was really going for a good result in the TT, sadly he didn’t come away with what he wanted in that event, he placed 5th in U23 whilst I embarrassed myself with a terrible time. That’s not why I was there though, I was all in for the road race. The week leading into nationals Derek and I did a short local TT just for fun, Derek is an amazing time trial rider, so when I was only 3 seconds behind him on the 15 km TT, I was pleasantly surprised.

It was a terribly rainy the day of the road race. All of the RaceClean guys met in a cafe to talk about a plan but it didn’t take long, we knew who to follow and that would be everything. We started and there were a number of attacks from the gun. My teammates and I were doing a great job to make sure we were always represented. After two hours of heavy rain and constant attacks, the race was paused due to heavy lightning, something that myself and many of the Canadian WorldTour pros had never seen.

Some time later, after we had all nearly froze, the race was re-started. Some of the pros did not bother to restart with us, which I thought was very silly and they were not representing themselves well. After the restart we were in a great position, and attacks were going everywhere. At one point for about ten minutes there was a lead group of about 20 with 4 RaceClean riders including myself, I thought we might make it but some teams were not happy and we all got pulled back into the peloton

Eventually a strong wind picked up and the race was split to pieces. I missed the lead group but a good number of my teammates made it, so I was just covering bridging attempts and monitoring the situation from behind. Pretty mad to have not made the lead group, but not much you can do once it’s gone. I was very happy to see local rider and genuine great guy Matteo Dal-cin take home the jersey though, very well deserved.

Now it is back home for a quick stop before I head back to Europe for the summer block of racing. Thanks for reading my quick wrap on 2017 Nationals!

Edward Walsh