Manhattan Beach Grand Prix highlights

On Sunday I cruised up to the Manhattan Beach Grand Prix. I had never been to a pro road race, I took as many photo’s as I could. Rashaan Bahati took from Rock Racing took the pro race. He was flying down the final straight way lookin super mean!

Click here for final results on the day.

The highlight for me was hanging with Sellers at the Motor Tabs booth and taking to people about his incredible product. The Fluid Recovery booth had lot’s of action also. I love how both of these brands support local cycling!

Click here to see the rest of the race day photos.

The race report below if from Travis Wilkerson of Team Sho-Air/Sonance Elite Cycling. Who better to give a report than a guy that was in the race. These dudes showed up big time and were working hard. So fun to see them race as strong as they did.

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This weekend was the infamous Manhattan Beach GP. Always a favorite race of SoCal riders, it is an event everyone wants to win. MBGP is an NRC, and therefore the Elite Team was split up. At NRC races, the pro-1′s race by themselves, giving the cat.2′s their own race as well. We lined up a solid squad for the cat.2 race, and as the prime bell started ringing we started taking laps. There were about 10 primes in all given out in our 60 minute scramble, and we got 5 of them. The last 3 laps, as usual at MB, got a little crazy.

Lots of people bumping and throwing shoulders. At the start of the last lap I had Charon’s wheel and as we hit the hill, we got boxed in. I was yelling at Charon to get us out, and just then, in the turn at the top, some idiot crashed. Sweet, we had our way out. Just then Brian and George came up the left and gave us a free ride to the front. I slotted in about 7th spot as we headed into the bottom turn. Charon was a rider or two behind me, when an over zealous racer decided he could hold 34mph through the outside of that turn. He was wrong in thinking that. He was next to me about a half bike length up and to my left when he hit the deck, almost going under me as he did it. It caused me to tap brakes and loose about 10m to the front runners. I got around a few guys and got up into 6th place. Not the result we were looking for but not terrible either. MBGP is a tough race, and it’s any body’s race out of that last corner.

The pro-1 started right after with Tommy, Kirk, and MJ in there. It was another fast race, and with last year’s winner, Bahati, out there looking to repeat, Rock Racing was going to keep it together. They did and Bahati won, but Tommy got in there and mixed it up at the NRC level coming in 15th place, and only the 3rd non-pro across the line. Kirk was not far behind in the mid-20′s.

Thanks,

Travis
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Don’t forget about the Aliso Viejo Grand Prix on July 12. You can find all of the details on the race by clicking here.

Andy B
outsideallday.com