Yellow Feast

compilation of team contributions

May 13, 2006 -- The Houston Grand Criterium turned out to be a truly GRAND event! A greatly organized race with food, massages and freebies for everyone thanks to our generous sponsors. Tilson Homes put in a lot of effort and money with crazy payouts and primes to make this an amazing event. This led to race fields and speeds much larger and faster the customary Texas race.

Racing started with the 4/5s in a field of 75 racers with six racers representing Team Tilson Homes. It was the first road race for Matt and Allen, both of who flew the Tilson yellow in break away attempts, but soon realized that the pack was too large and fast to accomplish such feat. The race came down to a sprint finish, with five of our racers in the front and one guy from Hotel San Jose breaking away, James decidedly chased for the team with 500 meters to go. Sergio and Matt followed but Matt and James touched shoulders, James ended up on the ground and Sergio was also cut off, leading to the 20, 21, and 22 positions for Sergio, Brian, and Matt.

With adrenaline still pumping up, these guys morphed into the cheering section from hell chanting for the Cat 3/4 guys, whose filed reached the maximum limit of 100 racers! Nearly all of the seven Tilson guys at this race spent some time up in front either controlling the race or making an attack! Slade made a bold and courageous move flying the team colors and getting off the front for the last couple of laps, nearly succeeded! Tom, Jeremey, and Mark also attacked at various points during the race. Unfortunately, Mark was taken out at one of the few crashes during the race. In the last kilometer, Jason pulled Tom who moved out to take on the final sprint, but in a very chaotic finish the effort was a little short. Tom was the first of our team to cross the finish and he also picked a prime.

The Cat 1/2/3 race was also a substantial field of 75 racers with nine Team Tilson Homes riders, several being repeat customers who raced the Cat 3/4 crit an hour earlier! Tom rode a bold first few laps going toe-to-toe with the best riders in Texas before sitting up and retiring from the race. Paul proved his strength and handling skills by escaping a bad crash when another rider got his foot in Paul’s front wheel! He managed to stay upright, get a wheel at the pit and back to the race! At the finish, Alex and Greg led the charge of the peloton chasing a break of seven riders including our own fast-rising star, Jimmy Clarke, who finished in fifth place!

Another highlight of the race was the Kids Kup. The Tilson guys brought support to this activity and Freezeman was King of Chaos Corner teaching all the kids about bike safety. The 7 golden rules as he called it, and the most important one being, “Do not ride like Freeze.” With our custom Cannondale Rush bikes, Matt served as Sweeper and yours truly as Rabbit for all the kids’ races. These kids were awesome, fearless and fast. The course had one nasty downward sloping loose turn that scrapped a few knees but all the kids got right back up and took off to the chase. They also stood on the course’s only climb grunting and pounding the pedals trying to catch up while others flew down the hill at speeds so fast Matt had to break LT to catch back up. Man, these kid’s parents are in for a real treat!