Gateway Cup: Iris Slappendel gets final day Benton Park Classic win

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Heading into the final day of the 2016 Gateway Cup weekend, the field faced the most challenging course thus far with ten technical corners and little room for recovery. Throughout the weekend, the United Health Care team had largely come up short in both the men and women's field, always taking responsibility for the racing, but seeing the race turn against them at the finish. As each race started at the Benton Park Classic, it was clear that UHC planned to go down swinging and leave their mark on the Gateway Cup.

From the start of the race, both the IsCorp p/b SmartChoice MRI and United Health Care teams took full responsibility for the race as each put two riders in a six-woman breakaway in the very first lap. With Skylar Schneider of IsCorp and Iris Slappendel of United Health Care in the move, there was a good chance the break would lead from start to finish. However, at the halfway point, the efforts of some of the smaller teams in the race brought the move within reach, prompting Samantha Schneider, thus far the only women's winner in the 2106 Gateway Cup, to counter attack, with Coryn Rivera on her wheel. The two carved out a solid thirty-second advantage until four laps to go when the field cut the gap down and set up Skylar Schneider for another move with Slappendel. With so little racing left, the two women went to the line together and Slappendel took the win ahead of Schneider in what was the only win from someone other than Sam Schneider throughout the weekend. Samantha herself shot out of the chasing group to take third and the omnium while the IsCorp team locked up the overall podium with Skylar in second and Yuselly Soto in third

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