The Madera Stage Race ended today with some serious drama. It was an 80 mile, 5 lap, road race. But first, let me share with you the GC going into the day:

1. Ben Jacques-Maynes
2. Paul Mach at 32 seconds
3. Rob Britton at 1:30
4. Jesse Moore at 1:48

The race started off with the typical attacking for the first lap. At the start of the second, Ben and Jesse got off the front with 4 others. A chase organized but it wasn't sustainable and the gap kept growing. As it climbed past 1:30, Rob and I started to worry.

So lets recap. We're just vibing in the pack while our leader is off the front, riding us out of the GC. We strategized a bit and came up with a plan to attack over the rollers with 2 laps to go.

That worked, and now Rob, Jim Wingert and I were on a direct flight to Suffer City. The gap wasn't coming down that fast and it took a while for Ben to learn we were chasing. Once he did, he attacked and soloed to the win.

Meanwhile, after an hour of chasing and a half lap to go, we finally caught what was left of the break, Jesse and some Yahoo. Jim and I attacked and finished a little bit ahead of the rest. The finish order was Ben, Paul, Jim, Jesse, Rob.

In the end the GC was unchanged, but man did Ben and Jesse make us work for it.