Wellens ousts Page once more in Sun Prairie

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Former double world champion Bart Wellens (Telenet-Fidea) ended his US cyclo-cross campaign with a convincing victory at the Planet Bike Cup day two, round two of the Exergy Cyclo-cross US Gran Prix in Sun Prairie. The Belgian ‘cross specialist' soloed to victory ahead of Jonathan Page (Planet Bike-Blue) in second and Ryan Trebon (LTS-Felt) in third.

"Wellens wasn’t feeling well at the beginning but I wanted to stay with him and Peeters and stay out of trouble from the very beginning," Page told Cyclingnews. "These are Wellens’ kind of condition so it is no surprise that he won. He was just that much better than both me and Ryan."

"I’m happy with second," he said. "Family and friends were out cheering and the people from Planet Bike. It was nice to be here in front of all of Madison, it is a great cycling community."

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Wellens took the series lead following his victory ahead of previous day’s winner Trebon. However, he will not be contending the remaining events at the New Belgium Cup in Fort Collins, Derby City Cup in Louisville and Deschutes Brewery Cup in Bend.

Cold, rain and mud gives Wellens the advantage in Sun Prairie

Rob Peeters (Telenet-Fidea) took the hole shot onto the sloppy grass section at the start of the race. The Belgian was followed by Jonathan Page (Planet Bike-Blue) along with teammates Christian Heule, Jamey Driscol and Tim Johnson (Cannondale p/b Cyclocrossworld.com), Ryan Trebon (LTS-Felt) and Jeremy Powers (Rapha-Focus), among others.

Wellens quickly moved into the race lead following a solo attack with four laps to go. His small but quick steps on the slick run up gave him an advantage over his competitors and he gained several more seconds ahead of chasers Trebon and Peeters.

Peeters was in a good position, with a teammate off the front, and forced Trebon to do much of the chasing. However, Trebon displayed his strength and managed to gain some time ahead of Peeters in pursuit of Wellens.

Peeters eventually fell off pace and was soon joined by chasers Page and Heule. Driscoll rode through the thick mud slightly further back in sixth position.

Page showed his strength in the mud and worked his way to the front of the chase group in pursuit of Wellens. The American was followed by rival Trebon. "It was drizzly during the race," Page said. "It made the course more wet and muddy."

The rain fell harder as the race progressed creating think, soupy mud sections and forcing riders into the mechanic’s pit twice per lap.

Noticeably absent from the last half of the race was Johnson, who pulled out following a crashing during the closing laps.

Wellens passed through the start-finish line with two laps to go and a 15 second gap ahead of the pair of chasers Trebon and Page. Trebon opened a small lead to Page through some of the muddy corners and powerful straightaways, riding in second place.

Wellens increased his lead to roughly 30 seconds on the final lap and looked to have the race win sewn up, barring crashes or mechanicals. The race for second place heated up between Trebon and Page who rode several seconds apart for much of the last lap.

On the last lap, Page took a clean bike and managed to maneuver passed Trebon for second place. Trebon slid out on the final run in to the finish line.

"I switched a bike and had a fresh set of tires," Page said. "I caught up and just kept the pressure on him. It was either him or I that was going to slide out at some point in the last off camber corners before the finish, and it was him. That was it really."

Riding in the top ten positions were Peeters, Heule, Driscoll, Powers, Troy Wells (Clif Bar) and Geoff Kabush (Maxxis-Rocky Mountain) and Zac McDonald (Rapha-Focus).