Lucas Bourgoyne and Marlies Mejias Garcia dominate sprints at Tour of Somerville races on Memorial Day

Marlies Mejias Garcia (Virginia's Blue Ridge TWENTY28) and Lucas Bourgoyne (Team Cadence Cyclery p/b Encore Wire) claimed sprint victories on Monday in New Jersey at the Tour of Somerville. Spectators packed the course of the oldest running bike race in the US, which celebrated an 80th edition on Memorial Day.

Bourgoyne held off a surging Ben Oliver (MITOQ-NZ Cycling Team), who won the day before at the Easton Criterium, with Jordan Parra (Bikers Cycling Team) finishing third. It was Bourgoyne's first victory wearing the stars-and-stripes jersey as the newly-crowned elite men's US Pro criterium champion, fittingly taking the win on a national holiday carrying the national colours. 

The 24-year-old Texan won the USPRO title in Charleston, West Virginia on Friday night, and then traveled with his team to North Carolina the next day to secure the men's overall title at USA CRITS, scoring a top 10 at Winston-Salem Cycling Classic. 

With her victory on Monday, Mejias won her second race in three days, on Saturday winning the field sprint in Winston-Salem, but her Virginia’s Blue Ridge Team Twenty28 squad had to be patient. Automatic-ABUS set the tone from the gun in Somerville, riding aggressively at the front. 

All attacks were nullified to keep the field together throughout the race and then Automatic-ABUS tried to light a fire on the bell lap. But it was the VBR TWENTY28 team massing at the front of the race on the final corners to deliver their leader to the line. Mejias won a dominant sprint victory over Odette Lynch (Fearless Femme) and Meg Barker (TEKKERZ).

"Tour of Somerville was celebrating 80 years and is the longest running race in America so we were really excited to have the chance to race! The field was the most stacked we’ve seen so far with riders from the US, Chile, Cuba, Mexico, New Zealand, Great Britain, and Colombia all lining up. It was our third day in a row of racing, and we were ready to go all in together," Rylee McMullen, who finished fifth in Somerville, said in a VBR TWENTY28 team statement.

"Everything finally just clicked. Sofia and I covered everything, and in the final, I led Marlies out before things got chaotic. We did a clean switch mid-corner, and Marlies had perfect timing in the sprint to finish off a big shift from the team with the win!"

Just one day before, many of the same riders competed in the Easton Crit, located only 40 miles away in Easton, Pennsylvania. Virginia's Blue Ridge TWENTY28 took the top step of the podium again, this time with Sofia Arreola winning ahead of Grace Arlandson (Automatic-ABUS) and Fearless Femme's Lynch.

In the men's contest, a three-rider breakaway got away from the field with 15 laps to go, with Oliver scoring the victory. His MITOQ-NZ Cycling Project teammate James Gardner would settle for third behind second-placed Juan Arango (Bikers Cycling Team).

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