Cobb Park Race Recap!

It has been busy this week at Casa Illinois Cycling.  I, your Illinois Cycling Association Secretary, had a Canadian guest in town. Half Acre Cycling’s very own Cycle-Smart coach, Shaun Adamson, was sharing his wisdom at Half Acre’s Women’s Road Clinic on Saturday. Then I headed out with Shaun and some teammates to Kankakee for the Cobb Park Criterium.

The women’s open race was canceled due to having only one pre-registered rider (who was also registered in the 4s).  Cobb Park can’t get a break when it comes to scheduling.  Last year it coincided with ToAD and this year with Speedweek, Tour of the Gila AND Joe Martin, all of which had some Illinois women entrants.

Daphne Karagianis (Cuttin' Crew) continues total Women’s Cat 4 domination, although this time she said she was hoping to just lead her teammate, Jamie GavinSmyth for the finish. That didn’t work out, however, because Jamie crashed in the final sprint. Thankfully, she was not badly injured.

Back from a 20ish year hiatus, Jason Sutherland (Region Racing), interviewed below, won the Cat 4 race in a field sprint.  That podium was rounded out by Alexei Perelet (Wild Card Cycling) and Michael Dutczak (South Chicago Wheelmen).

A large break that formed early held on for the rest of the in Masters 30+ race. Jeffrey Whiteman of Flatlandia posted up crazy early as he won! I thought that took some guts.  We all know what can happen if you post up too early. Ok well I don’t PERSONALLY have any experience with winning/posting up, but I have heard bad things can happen.

Full results are already up on USA Cycling.

My final word on the Cobb Park Crit is that the South Chicago Wheelmen Juniors are fast racers and very well spoken. Just listen to what Mitchell Dutczak has to say about his plans for the rest of the season:

Here's the rest of that interview with Mitchell Dutczak and Sean McCarthy:

And Here is Cat 4 winner Jason Sutherland: