The yellow-and-red of the Saturn Cycling dynasty remains atop the general classification at the Cascade Cycling Classic, with Tom Danielson and Lyne Bessette all but assured victories heading into Sunday’s final criterium stage after a Friday night criterium and Saturday’s hilly circuit race.

The Twilight Zone
A volatile twilight criterium held Friday night in downtown Bend, Oregon, yielded no change in the overall, with Heather Albert (Team Basis) and Chris Horner (Saturn) taking the stage wins.

Bessette powered off the front halfway through the women’s 45-minute race, followed by Albert and Magen Long (The Bicycle Shop). Early on, Bessette told her breakaway companions — later joined by Laura Downey (Minute Maid-Dasani) — that if they worked together to stay away, she wouldn’t contest the sprint.

“Winning everything is not always the best thing,” Bessette said. “Those girls work hard all year and they train, and I only train, so I think it’s good to give them a chance also to get a stage win. It’s good for women’s cycling to have somebody else win.”

Albert, 35, was more than happy to take Bessette up on the offer, attacking into the final turn and beating the 18-year-old Long to the line; Bessette remained true to her word, soft-pedaling the final straight.

“[Long] was third at Fitchburg,” Albert said, “so I know that she’s got legs. I just hoped that if I went early I’d get the jump on her so she wouldn’t catch me, and I held her off.”

The men’s race was noteworthy not so much for Horner’s stage win ahead of Alex Candelario (Prime Alliance), but for the carnage on the course, as a half-dozen crashes landed a majority of the 150-rider field on the tarmac at one point or another. Halfway into the crowded 60-minute event a pileup sent more than 25 riders into the wheel pit for a free lap.

Another crash with three laps remaining brought down a dozen riders, including race leader Tom Danielson (Saturn), who rode hard to cover his losses, finishing 10 seconds behind GC threats Jonathan Vaughters (Prime Alliance) and Chris Wherry (Navigators). However, after some deliberation, chief commissaire Bill Wykoff declared all riders in the field would be given the same time so as not to penalize GC riders caught up in the crash.

Health Net’s Gord Fraser — the hands-down favorite for the stage win — had an untimely mechanical with three laps remaining, and instead of looking to his teammates for a lead out, he struck up a conversation with Horner, whose Saturn team had made a “gentleman’s agreement” with Health Net to control the race.

“With the three laps to go I compacted my back wheel on a ripple in the pavement,” Fraser said. “It was so out of whack that, literally, if I stopped pedaling I’d be stopped in about three seconds. So I was like, ‘Well, we did all this work together,’ so I said to Horner, ‘I’ll stay on your wheel as long as possible, and if you go I’ll let the gap go because I can’t follow.’”

“It’s just so disappointing,” Fraser continued. “I didn’t feel a stitch of pain all night, and I hedged everything on this race. I’m so frustrated, but I’m glad Horner won since that team controlled the race. It just shows what a champion Horner is, that he was setting tempo all night and he still won.”

And while Horner’s win in front of his adopted hometown crowd of Bend was likely the most heart-rending outcome to the wreck-filled event, it didn’t feel that way to Prime Alliance, which set up Candelario perfectly in the final lap, only to nearly run over a lapped rider.

“There was some lapped rider going like 10 mph in the middle of the apex turn,” Candelario said. “[Teammate John] Peters didn’t really see him and so he slammed his brakes on and I slammed my brakes on. Horner saw him, somehow, and swung on the outside and had all this momentum and jumped through. It was disappointing, since we had our lead-out right, but at least we didn’t crash, since I almost hit Peters pretty hard.”

“As soon as they hit the brakes for the lapped rider I just punched it,” Horner said, grinning ear to ear after winning in front of friends and family. “You can’t hit the brakes with two corners to go. Candelario is faster than I am, but I came out of the corner with no brakes.”

All Together Now — Or Not

Saturday’s circuit race of 14 miles — with 1000 feet of climbing per lap — saw Bessette repeat her performances from earlier road-race stages of the week, riding away from the outmatched peloton and turning the event into a long, solo training ride.

“I took the first lap [of four, with the pack] because I didn’t know the course,” Bessette said. “Then at a lap-and-a-half I went, and they never caught me. I felt really good. It was definitely a test for me, to know how hard I can go and how long I can stay out there.”

Albert finished second, more than four minutes back.

The men’s race saw a break of four riders — Fraser and teammate Jason Lokkesmoe, Gordon McCauley (Schroeder Iron) and Cameron Evans (Broadmark Capital) — away for much of the day. With none of the riders a threat to the GC, Saturn was content to ride tempo and let Fraser contest for the stage win.

As the gap grew to four minutes, Navigators’ team director Ed Beamon and Prime Alliance team director Kirk Willett made a “gentleman’s agreement” of their own: both teams sent riders to the front to bring in the break, which was caught at the top of the KOM — a spot that also served as the uphill finish line one lap later.

Once back together Saturn upped the pace, sending Aussie Nathan “The Bonecrusher” O’Neill to the front with 5km remaining, shattering the pack. Approaching the summit, Navigators’ Chris Baldwin made a move, but Horner quickly chased him down, and at the top of the climb it was David Clinger taking his second stage win of the race, just nipping Danielson at the line.

“[Jonathan] Vaughters was leading Clinger out,” Danielson said, “and I was like, ‘Uh-oh, he’s gonna open a gap and Vaughters is going to take off,’ so I started fighting Clinger for his wheel and he just gave me a little elbow, and I was like, ‘All right, all right.’ When he hit the steeps I attacked, but he just got me at the line.”

Adam Sbeih of Sierra Nevada-Clif Bar finished third, with Wherry fourth. With no time bonuses the top-three in the GC remains unchanged.

“I got a nice lead out from Vaughters and Danny [Pate],” Clinger said. “I thought it looked like a nice finish and called it at the beginning of the race. The team was riding for me and I didn’t touch the front the whole day.”