Sofia Gomez Villafañe (Specialized Off-Road) continued her dominant performances at the Belgian Waffle Ride series this year, winning the pro women's category by over 13 minutes at the Utah event, which was shortened slightly in light of tough weather conditions. It was closer in the men's pro race but still a clear-cut victory for a cramping Peter Stetina, who managed to fend off a spirited pursuit.
“You all put that final climb too far away, it was still an hour to go,” quipped an exhausted Stetina in an interview on the race social media straight after finishing.
Stetina later added on his instagram that: "The day was very complicated with freezing temps, strong winds, rugged singletrack, and motivated riders taking their chances. I’m proud how I managed it all, but holy hell I died a thousand deaths in those final 20 miles holding off a group of 4 chasers. Those last 40 minutes were purgatory, but the pain melted in sight of the banner. Been a minute since I bagged a biggie."
Despite a determined chase Adam Roberge (Felt UN1TD) was 46 seconds behind Stetina, while nearly a minute and a half later Andrew L'Esperance led a group of three over the line with Julian Gagne (Equipe Qui Roule) fourth and Torbjørn Andre Røed (Trek-Driftless) fifth.
In the women's category of the event Australia's Courtney Sherwell took second place in a tight battle with Emily Newsom, though there was no chance of hauling back Gomez Villafañe who had charged off early in the race and stretched out an unclosable gap.
“The headwind at the beginning and then the couple of underpasses are always a little scary, so positioning was key," Gomez Villafañe said as she explained how the race played out.
“The group was really together for the first 30 miles or so and once we got on the two track it got a little more dicey. I just made a really hard effort to try to make a selection … and then got into a nice group, one of the guys kind of pulled us for a long time, and [I] brought it home,” said the rider who rode across the line solo.
Belgian Waffle Ride Utah took place in the southern part of the state, delivering an event with gravel, sand and rocks accompanied by the challenge of altitude, with Cedar City sitting at 5,846 feet above sea level.
The mass start race was shortened from 127 miles (204km) to 104 miles (167km) after cold temperatures and windy conditions pounded course recons on Thursday and Friday, with temperatures dropping to 20°F (-7°C) Saturday morning and a chance of snow showers in the forecast. Wind gusts of over 40 miles per hour (64 kph) on Friday lessened on race day, but as Gomez Villafañe mentioned, there were still sections on the course where the wind had a telling impact on the second race in the Tripel Crown series.
The Tripel Crown will conclude with BWR California on April 28, which will be the ultimate decider, carrying extra weighted points to settle the score. The Tripel Crown delivers a prize purse of $25,500 and when the individual race prize money throughout the BWR series is included the total purse equals $37,000.
Gomez Villafañe leads the pro women category of the Tripel Crown with 120 points, 30 ahead of Sherwell and 40 in front of Cecily Decker (Scuderia Pinarello), who came sixth in Utah and Arizona, the first race of the series. In the pro men category Stetina's win on Saturday has taken him to the top of the leaderboard with 100 points but Røed is just 8 points back and Lance Haidet 18 points away from the top spot. Hadiet came 12th in Utah but accumulated a solid points base in the Arizona event when he came second behind Keegan Swenson (Santa Cruz Bicycles-SRAM), who didn't race Utah.
