Last weekend was the final weekend for the SWCCC in Albuquerque, NM. The Adoption Exchange featured an ITT, Crit, and Road Race in two days. The ITT was the conference championship for that event.
Winners for the 20 km ITT were: Joey Iuliano (Men's A, UA), Doug Torres (Men's B, UNM), Chris Zedick (Men's C, NAU), Stefanie Sichler (Women's A, ASU), and Allysen Wendt (Women's B, UA).
The crit started off sunny and slowly became cloudy with gusty winds and a bit of rain. The Men's B saw the worst conditions with rain and wind, while the other categories just had the wind to deal with. The Men's A raced with the P/1/2/3 and the race was blown to shreds in the first lap. UA's Max Rich, Joey Iuliano, and David Carlson were the only collegiate riders to survive the chaos.
Sunday's road race featured a 31 mile loop completed twice for most categories and a 42 mile big loop for the Men's A and P/1/2/3 fields. Each lap had a trip up Heart Break Hill- a long and steep climb early in the lap. The Men's C race was won by NAU's Chris Zedick, the B by UNM's Douglas Torres, and the A by UA's Max Rich. The Women's A was won by UNM's Anona Whitely.
For the omniums, UA remained on top and took home the Division 1 team omnium over ASU. GCU took home the Division 2 award. In the Men's A omnium, Max Rich came in first over teammates David Carlson and last year's winner Joey Iuliano. The Women's A Division 1 omnium was hotly contested and came down to the road race. With current leader Lindsey Ryder (ASU) away, UA's Allison Alterman was able to score enough points to over take her despite the efforts from Ryder's teammates to defend her lead. The Women's A Division 2 omnium was won by Alexis Gannis.
The following teams qualified for nationals:
UA (4 riders for the crit, 6 for the road race)
ASU (4 riders for the crit, 4 for the road race)
NAU (1 rider for each)
GCU (1 rider for each, division 2)
Receiving call ups:
Div 1 Men's Road Race: Quinn Keogh
Div 1 Men's Crit: Max Rich
Div 1 Women's RR: Lindsey Ryder
Div 1 Women's Crit: Riley Pankratz
Div 2 Women's Crit: Alexis Gannis
Div 2 Women's RR: Alexis Gannis
Congrats to everyone and thanks for a fantastic 2014 road season!
