Saturday, Oct. 11, 2003



 By Kris Westwood

 After three days of individual time trials, the focus of the worlds has switched to the mass start road races. Instead of battling the wind and course alone, competitors race together and must master strategy and bike handling in order to succeed.

 Racing opened today with the junior women's 74.4-kilometre race, held over six laps of the tough 12.4-kilometre Hamilton circuit, which includes two climbs of the Niagara escarpment.

 Jumpy nerves and a inexperienced riders in the 58-strong peloton combined to produce three crashes in the first two laps, which put paid to several competitors' chances, including Canadian Emilie Roy, who fell twice and damaged her bike so badly she had to abandon.

 The climbs and several attacks combined to whittle the pack down to just 24 riders with five kilometres to go, and three riders broke free on the last climb: Irina Tolmacheva of Russia, Kate Nichols of Australia and Loes Sels of Belgium.

 But the German team chased hard down the descent, and a lead group of 11 rounded the final bend with 300 metres to go.

 Loes Merkerink of the Netherlands launched her sprint immediately after the corner, and despite strong challenges from Tolmacheva and Germany's Sabine Fischer, she held on for the win.

 "It was a risk and it worked well," said Merkerink, who added a gold medal to the silver she won in the time trial on Tuesday. "We caught them in the final corner and I sprinted - I didn't think."

 Tolmacheva, nursing a cut chin from a fall after the finish, said she had been preparing for this race all year, while Fischer thanked her teammate, Bianca Knoepfle, for leading her out in the sprint.

 The men's under-23 race, which covered 14 laps for 173.6 kilometres this afternoon, was a test of endurance as attack followed attack throughout.

 In the end, it was a canny Sergey Lagutin who won the title despite having only one teammate with him today.

 The 132 starters took it relatively easy on the first few laps before the racing really began to heat up around the half way point. Under pressure from repeated attacks by Johan Van Summeren of Belgium, a breakaway 12 riders formed, which included Lagutin, as well as riders from Italy, Holland, Belgium and Russia.

 With most of the strong teams represented up front the peloton did not chase hard, allowing the gap to grow to over 50 seconds with a lap to go. Van Summeren, Lagutin and Emanuele Sella of Italy all tried to break away, but by the top of the final climb there were still seven riders together.

 Meantime, the peloton was drawing closer, and started the last downhill just 20 seconds behind. World time trial champion Marcus Fothen of Germany launched an attack with Thomas Dekker on his wheel, and by the bottom of the descent they had bridged to the break. Dekker flew to the front of the group and made the final turn in front, but he faded to third as first Van Summeren and then Lagutin sprinted past him.

 "It was not very tactical because it was so hard," said Lagutin after the race.