The Killington Stage Race continued Sunday with the individual time trial. Ambrose was the only Canadian in the 50+ category, as they hit the road for the short but hilly 17.6km time trial. Ambrose put in a time of 26:11.30, good enough for 20th spot in an extremely competitive division. To put this in perspective, if Ambrose was in the 40+ category he would have been 8th. We’re talking world class athletes in this race! Checking back, Ambrose was 10 seconds slower than last year, but other riders lost more time compared to last year. Haluk Sarci, last year’s overall winner, dropped well over 2 minutes, and William Thompson, who was 3rd in last year’s TT, dropped about 38 seconds. A few guys managed to improve their times over last year, but it was unusual, likely due to a drastic change in wind direction.
Going into the finale on Monday, a 99km road race, Ambrose was 3:26 behind the leader. As usual a small pack of about 15 including Ambrose broke away from the field, getting some good separation before hitting the big mountain to finish the race. The last 8km is a nasty bit of business, basically climbing up a ski hill. Ambrose got to the finish in 10th spot, behind some of the toughest 50+ riders in the US.
In the overall standings, Ambrose jumped to 10th place after the road race, 5:52 off the pace. Brian Batke was the overall winner, with Kevin Hines taking second. Batke was 5th overall in the 50-54 category at the US national time trial championships in 2010. Hines was second in the 50-54 age group at the World Cylco-cross Championships in January. These guys are fast!