Compton wins Pan American Continental cyclo-cross title

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Katie Compton (Trek Factory Racing) finally put together a complete race on Sunday to win the inaugural Pan-Am Cyclocross Championships, on the third and final day of the Toyota Cincy3 Cyclocross Festival. After suffering mechanicals during Friday and Saturday's races, Compton was relieved to have everything come together for the biggest race of the weekend.

"It went much better today than the other days," said Compton. "Everything was functioning well, and since I didn't really race the last couple of days it definitely helped me compared to the other girls."

The Pan-Am championship was held at Devou Park in Covington, KY, and featured an extremely technical and hilly course that was praised by riders. Course features included challenging off-camber sections, punchy run ups, and a steep downhill style descent nicknamed the 'Pan-Am Plunge' by the announcers.

Meredith Miller (Noosa Pro CX) was first onto the grass at the start followed by Rachel Lloyd (California Giant-Specialized) and Courtenay McFadden (GE Capital-American Classic.) Georgia Gould (Luna Pro Team) and Compton made their way up to Miller and led a group of nine women at the end of the first lap. Compton moved to the front the next lap and only Gould could respond to the national champion's effort. The script for the race looked to be set as Miller, Lloyd, Pendrel and Antonneau settled into a seven second gap behind the leaders.

Gould, an Olympic mountain bike medalist, was the only rider that could match Compton on the technical course. "The course is just really fun," said Gould. "It had a really good flow to it. There were sections you could go fast and tight sections, just different places you could gain or loose a couple seconds here and there."

Compton continued to attack through the technical sections of the course, until the rubber band snapped and Gould was left behind. Compton quickly opened up a 12 second gap on Gould, and put together the flawless style of race she is renown for. Gould drifted back towards the chasers, which included Catherine Pendrel (Luna Pro Team), Meredith Miller (Noosa) and Kaitlin Antonneau (Cannondale-Cyclocrossworld.com.)

Pendrel fell of the pace in the run-ups, leaving Miller and to Gould battle it out for second place. In the final lap, Miller and Gould were neck and neck as they hurtled towards the finish. Antonneau dangled a few seconds behind them unable to make contact.

"I knew the last half lap I really wanted to lead because I didn't want her to make a mistake, since it's the second person that gets hurt," said Miller about her final move. "I wanted to lead through that, and felt confident enough in the sprint that I could still hold her off. It was lucky enough to play out that way."

Compton crossed the line to win the first continental cyclocross championship outside of Europe. Miller got the prime position heading into the finish and out sprinted Gould for second place. Antonneau (4th) and Pendrel (5th) rounded out the top five spots.

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