Tour of the Gila: McCabe wins stage 2 sprint in Fort Bayard

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Travis McCabe (Holowesko-Citadel) claimed his first Tour of the Gila stage victory in Fort Bayard after coming second last year and third place in 2014. McCabe topped Italian Marco Canola (UnitedHealthcare) and Neilson Powless (Axeon-Hagens Berman) in a reduced bunch sprint.

"It's awesome. I've been hunting this win for three years now," McCabe said. "It's been a progression, I was third two years ago, second last year, and now I finally won it. It feels fantastic. The team rode great today. I had Rob [Squire] leading me out into the last corner, and just kept it fast and furious. Robin Carpenter was off the front for the last 20km, so we were able to sit back and just wait for the sprint. I had good legs and was able to hold it to the line. It's exciting."

Race leader Lachlan Morton enjoyed a stage that was well-controlled by his Jelly Belly-Maxxis team, and took fourth in the sprint to maintain his 25 second advantage over Rally's Rob Britton.

McCabe protected his points jersey, while Sepp Kuss (Gateway-Harley Davidson) held onto the best young rider jersey. Morton remains in the lead of the mountains classification after a stage with three category three climbs.

The stage started at a rapid pace, with multiple attacks popping off the front along highway 180, but nothing could go clear until the race approached the first intermediate sprint, just 9.2km into the 122.6km stage.

The move was sparked when Emerson Oronte (Rally Cycling) got away with Kyle Murphy (Jamis) and Alfredo Ajpacaja Tax (Guatamala) shot out of the pack. They were chased by Bailey McKnight (H&R Block), who was in the attack on stage 1 and was placed second in the sprint competition. McKnight joined up with the leaders with Paul Thomas (Superissimo) and James Piccoli (Transports Lacombe/Devinci), while behind the Lupus team kept trying to get a rider into the move.

McKnight took out the sprint and then dropped back to the bunch, leaving Oronte and Murphy out front, being chased by Nicolau Tanovitchii (Lupus) and Jonny Clarke (UnitedHealthcare). On the climb to Pinos Altos, the four riders came together, but before the crest, Tanovitchii dropped off the pace, making it three men out front for the majority of the stage.

Murphy was the virtual leader on the road as the trio got their maximum lead at the second mountain sprint at Meadow Creek, holding 3:30 on the Jelly Belly-Maxxis led field. However, a stiff, gusty headwind in the valley along highway 35 kept the lead on a steady decline. With 45km still to race, the gap fell under the minute mark to 55 seconds. By the time they hit the turn onto the highway, the gap was in the single digits and their time out front was over.

"It was such a strong headwind that the break was doomed," McCabe said. "They came back, and it turned into a cross tailwind on the climb. Whenever it's a crosswind like that it's always hard."

Janier Acevedo (Jamis) attempted to attack up the climb after the feed zone, but the peloton was not letting him go. Axeon went to the front and shattered the peloton into two, with a dozen riders struggling in the cross tailwind in no man's land. Daniel Jaramillo (UnitedHealthcare) took the mountain sprint over Acevedo and Murphy. Evan Huffman (Rally Cycling), Tao Geoghegan Hart (Axeon) and Robin Carpenter (Holowesko-Citadel) popped off the front on the descent, gaining 20 seconds, but were pulled back by Jamis, looking to set up Sebastian Haedo and Jelly Belly, looking to protect Morton's race lead.

Holowesko-Citadel took control to put McCabe into position, and delivered him to the front at the final turn, and he took out the bunch sprint with apparent ease over Canola.

"Axeon went to the front and just drilled it. They were trying to get rid of sprinters like me and Haedo," McCabe said. "But I'm climbing well, and was really at the limit but able to make it up and over that. It broke the field up quite a bit, so it was a pretty reduced group coming into the sprint for the finish, and we had four guys there."

McCabe says he hopes to keep the sprint jersey until the end, but his next chance for a second stage win in Saturday's criterium might be handed over to teammate Miguel Bryan.

"Right now I'm just enjoying it and we'll see. I came into this race a little fatigued getting ready for Tour of California, so just to have the form that I have is exciting, and I'd love to keep it to the finish."

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