White takes Winston-Salem criterium win

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UnitedHealthcare’s Brad White took the men’s win Saturday at the Winston-Salem Classic Criterium in North Carolina, finishing first in the field sprint to put an exclamation on the victory after lapping the field with a seven-rider group. Hincapie Racing’s Dion Smith and Jelly Belly-Maxxis rider Gavin Mannion finished second and third. The day’s podium came from the breakaway that lapped the field with less than 15 laps to go.

In a classic tactical manoeuvre known in criterium circles as the 'Saturn release' after the late-90s team that employed it so successfully, the Unitedhealthcare team positioned White near the front on the final lap, then put criterium expert Hilton Clarke on his wheel to open up a gap and let White and teammate Carlos Alzate power away on the final half lap.

Like his teammate Alexis Ryan, who won from a breakaway that lapped the women's field, White was not necessarily the protected rider for UnitedHealthcare. "I'm a worker through and through, and I only get a couple of opportunities when I get in a breakaway, and try to make the most of those, today was one," White said.

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"It feels good, I don't usually get a chance to win. I have my brother, sister in law and dad here. It's not often you get to race in front of your family because we race all over the country, but to win in front of them was extra special."

White bridged across to solo attacker Mannion, who went away in the opening laps, in the final half hour of the 90-minute race with five other riders, including Hincapie's Smith and Andzs Flaksis, Jacob Sitler (Astellas), Connor McCutcheon (Airgas-Safeway), and Evan Murphy (Lupus). With UHC well known as a criterium powerhouse, it was surprising that the group worked so hard to lap the field, considering they were only delivering white to his well-drilled lead-out train.

"You see the course, and it looks like a course where a breakaway could lap up. Once the peloton slows on the uphill, boom, you gain 10", the lap isn't very long and all of a sudden you have that carrot in front of you. For me it was way better to lap the field rather than be one out of seven," White said. "When we lapped up my chances went up 100 per cent."

Mannion only wanted to stay safe, and hit out in the first few laps in an effort to avoid the chaos in the peloton on the short, fast course. To lap the field and take third was only a bonus. "I wanted to spend as little time as possible in the field," he told Cyclingnews. "UHC has their full crit team here, and they're pretty dialled winning these things. I don't think I had the legs to win the sprint anyhow. I knew exactly what they were going to do, there was nothing I could do about it. The podium is definitely a good result."

After the breakaway lapped the field, Astellas, UnitedHealthcare, Hincapie and Jelly Belly amassed at the front to try and give their riders an advantage. Hincapie sent Oscar Clarke up the road in a breakaway in the final 10 laps with hopes that one of Smith or Flaksis could get across, but it wasn't meant to be.

Smith said the team's strategy was to be aggressive and get in the breakaway, because they expected it to lap the field, but didn't question their efforts to lap the field and deliver White back into his team. "We didn't let him go to the front, they just have it so dialled. We're happy with what we did, we were aggressive. It's 50-50, we had two guys and we lapped the field, one of us could attack and have better odds. It didn't work out, but always nice to get on the podium and represent the team."

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