Daniel Jaramillo claims final Tour of the Gila stage

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The final day at the Tour of the Gila once again proved to be the deciding factor in the overall race for the UCI men, with Optum Pro Cycling's Carter Jones taking the final overall lead from UnitedHealthcare's Ben Day. Daniel Jaramillo (Jamis-Hagens Berman) once again proved his climbing prowess with his second mountain-top stage win of the race.

UnitedHealthcare's Mara Abbott secured her fourth overall win at the Gila by taking a second stage win with another impressive solo finish.

The Gila Monster Queen Stage is one of the toughest days on the US circuit. The men's 161.9km stage includes 2,738 meters of ascending over two category 3 climbs, two category 2 climbs and a category 1 climb, finishing in Pinos Altos. The women's 110.9km stage includes 1,710 meters of ascending over two category three climbs and one category 2 climb.

Jones prevails on Gila Monster

Jones, who started the day second overall after losing the lead during the previous day's criterium, needed to make up just 28 seconds on Day to take the overall win. But he also had to worry about Jamis-Hagens Berman's Gregory Brenes, who was just two seconds behind him, and Team SmartStop's Rob Britton, sitting just 10 seconds off Jones' mark.

Jones' team, which fumbled his lead the night before, rode flawlessly for him on Sunday. Optum put two riders, Will Routley and Tom Zirbel, into an early break of 16 that also included three 5-hour Energy riders; three riders from Hincapie Sportswear; two from Jelly Belly; two from Team SmartStop; Jamis-Hagens' Berman's Luis Amaran, who was briefly tthe leader on the road; and several domestic elite riders.

"I couldn't have had two better guys up there," Jones said. Zirbel helped power the break, while Routley conserved in hopes that Jones would bridge up to him at some point in the race. The plan worked out as Routley was still in the lead group as it reshuffled going up the category 1 Sapillo climb.

The new lead group of seven going up Sapillo included Routley, Amaran,
UnitedHealthcare's Jeff Louder, 5-hour's Jon Hornbeck and Chad Beyer, Hincpaie's Joe Schmalz, Jelly Belly's Serghei Tvetcov and SmartStop's Mike Torckler.

But the climb wreaked havoc at the front of the race, and by the time the riders were descending off the category 1 ascent, the new lead group included Brenes, Jaramillo and Matt Cooke of Jamis; Kirk Carlsen of Jelly Belly; Jones and Routley of Optum; and Britton and Flavio de Luna from SmartStop.

Day was in the second chase group of 17 riders, surrounded by teammates Jeff Louder, Lucas Euser, and Kiel Reinjen. The UnitedHealthcare climbers rode hard for their leader, but the group up front continued to pull away.

Cooke jumped away from the lead group with 20km remaining, building a gap of 40 seconds and putting pressure on the Optum and SmartStop riders to chase him down. Routley and de Luna did the yeoman's work for their leaders in pulling Cooke back, and he was in the fold as they hit 10km to go.

The leaders hung together well going up the final category three climb to the finish in Pinos Altos, with riders chasing down attacks for their team leaders and pinning everything on the final kilometers leading to the finish.

Jaramillo jumped away in the final run up to Pinos Altos, holding off Britton, Routely, de Luna, Carlsen, Brenes and Jones by three seconds. The other finished on the same time, launching Jones into his first-ever National Race Calendar and UCI overall win.

Jones gave Routley an extended hug at the finish and was effusive with his praise for his teammate.

"Will hung on, and he rode like 10 men in the finish there," Jones said.
"And then it was just coming down to a sprint. Not only did Will ride like 10 men chasing guys down, but then he got third on the stage. Unbelievable. And that was crucial because there were time bonuses that we needed to sweep up."

Jones beat Brenes in the overall by just two seconds, while Britton, who grabbed a four-second time bonus at the finish, was four seconds down on GC.

Jamis director Sebastian Alexandre said the team was happy about the stage win, but his emotions were mixed because the team came so close to the overall without bringing it home.

"It's a strange feeling," he said. "We're trying to enjoy the stage win, but we were so close to getting the overall win and we couldn't do it. Tomorrow I will look back and see that we won the KOM, sprint, team GC, three stages and second on GC. So there's not much we can ask, but we were so close.

"I think we played a very, very smart race from day one," Alexandre continued. "We played our cards until the last minute, but we didn't do it, and that's OK. Carter won, and he deserves it."

UnitedHealthcare director Mike Tamayo said he was proud of the team's effort, especially because most of his riders were coming off a tough spring in Europe and had little time to adjust to racing at altitude in New Mexico.

"We pulled a rabbit out of the hat at the criterium, which was nice," he said. "But we knew it was a tall order for us to climb with the Jamis guys. Those guys are climbing really well right now. And so we knew that they were going to make the race difficult for us today."

Abbott repeats 2013 performance

Attacks from the gun in the women's race led to several early breakaways, but success for the escape attempts was hard to come by until Olivia Dillon (Colavita Fine Cooking) gained about 30 seconds on an already splintered peloton. Strong crosswinds aided the chase as Dillon pressed on, and a group of seven soon bridged before the second bonus sprint about halfway through the 112km race.

The lead group now included Dillon, Julie Emmerman (Rally Sport), Kimberly Johnson (Cloud Racing), Sharon Laws (UnitedHealthcare), Joanne Kiesanowski (Team Tibco), Heather Fischer (DNA Cycling), Alison Tetrick (Twenty16) and Anna Sanders (FCS-Zngine).

With representation in the break, UnitedHealthcare rode tempo on the front for Abbott until the bottom of the Sapillo climb.

Unitedhealthcare mechanic Adrian Hedderman, who took the wheel of the team car Sunday after director Rachel Heal left for this week's Tour of Britain, said the team was happy to let the breakaway go as long as it could hold the gap under three minutes.

The gap was well below that when the field hit the bottom of the Sapillo climb, the day's major hurdle, and that's when things exploded in both the breakaway and the peloton.

Abbott attacked the group, just as she did last year, and only Flavia Oliviera (FCS-Zngine) and Abby Mickey (Twenty16) were able to follow. The trio caught and passed the former leaders on their way up the climb, but Oliviera and Mickey were unable to hold Abbott's pace, and the defending champion was solo as she hit the top with about 24km to go.

Abbott held off the chase up to Pinos Altos and took her second-consecutive win of the Gila Monster stage. Abbott finished the stage 1:54 ahead of Oliviera and 2:27 ahead of Mickey. She took the overall by 4:13 over Oliviera and 4:55 over Mickey.

The overall win marked Abbott's fourth at the race, and it was even more special because her parents were there to see it.

"This race is really special and I adore it, especially because my parents are here to see it," Abbott said. "My parents don't get to come to many bike races, so to get to share the experience with them is really, really fun for me. This is the part of my life that they don't see. So I'm happy to bring them along."

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