The Ocala Stage Race enters its 7th year as the last hurrah of the spring season.

UPDATED March 14, 2013

The online Registration for the Pinellas Park Circuit Race will stay open until NOON on FRIDAY. We are giving you as long as possible to get this done. There will NOT be any registration for Pinellas Park at the Tampa Crit.  Please note that if you sign the online release with USACycling and own your own timing chip, that line moves very fast so do yourself a favor and pre-register. 

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This year marks the 7th Annual Pinellas Park Circuit Race that has for the past 5 years followed the Tampa Crit. Florida Velo is proud to offer this great course that features a 2.2 mile route and a nice sweeping run to the finish line. After a few tough TopView Sports courses this one is a bit on the easier side and often features breakaways. Come enjoy the park like setting near at the Finish Line area and the ample parking and nice long 100KM Pro race. You won't want to miss this one.   Both Days are part of the FloridaCycling.Com Bill Bone Pro Am and will award points!

Pedro Medina takes out the Victory at the Ferndale circuit race on day one of the Lake Mary Weekend in the Masters 35+ "A" field. 

This week we welcome Sebastian Morfin to our race recap writing team. This young Cat 3 is on his way through the ranks so look out for him in a couple of years. 

Cat 3/4 Saturday: 

Saturday consisted of a circuit race, the weather was perfect, it was no longer sub 60 degrees and the wind was fairly calm. 33 racers lined up on the start line and before we knew it we were off into our 60 minute race. A couple of big teams were Hoovers Market, Gearlink Racing INC., and Interactive Metronome Development. Towards the beginning there were a couple of attacks including one of about 5 riders that had around 20 seconds on the field. Once they were brought back JP Gilbert (Interactive Metronome Dev) started attacking and tried to get away but the peloton wouldn’t let him. With 5 laps to go, I bridged to a solo rider, Jeremy Hauff (Compass Cycling Team) but we were caught with 1.5 laps to go. Eduardo Arboleda (Interactive Metronome Dev) counter-attacked and went solo for the victory! I managed to recover quickly and won the field sprint, finishing 2nd, while Casey Braga (Interactive Metronome Dev) got 3rd overall.

 Cat3/4 Sunday: 

    Another great day, our race started at 2:30 and lasted 50 minutes. There were larger teams including Infinity Bike Shop, Hoovers Market, Orlando Road Club, and Interactive Metronome Dev. It was a fairly simple, wide open crit with no technical turns. The first turn exposed you to a raging crosswind that had us in the gutter every lap. Once again relatively few attacks towards the beginning, a couple of guys broke away around minute 25 including Alex Couture (Relaj Cycling), Mark Boults (Naples Cyclery powered by T2), Eduardo Arboleda (Interactive Metronome Dev) and Jordan Hoover (Hoovers Market) who got the Clif Bar Prime. With 5 laps to go, my teammate Casey Braga attacked and opened a gap of around 25 seconds. Attacks in the peloton were going left and right despite our efforts to block. They caught Casey with half a lap to go and there was a counterattack but he was swallowed up quickly. On the penultimate stretch, Eduardo Arboleda attacked and won solo with a 2 second lead, while I again won the field sprint, finishing 2nd. Scott Spees finished 3rd to round up the cat 3 podium, while Marc Boults, Christopher Alvarez, and Brian Collie earned the cat 4 podium. Overall a great weekend!

View the full results here...

Results...

The 2013 edition of the Spring Fling in Deland promoted by WAM Events was the first race of the Florida Ranking System. Good crowds showed up to contest the weekend.  The new split masters 35+ field seemed to be a huge hit as both fields had great numbers. In the "A" race Ronaldo Tavares picked up the win on Saturday and at Sunday's Road Race, Clermont's Corbett Brown of Team Compass snagged his first victory since 2006. The pro 1-2 field saw the win slip away to a non Florida rider each day as Colon Ortiz bested the field at both races.  The Road race 2nd place went to long time Florida Racer who has come out of retirement to claim 2nd place in front of David Guttenplan. 
 In the Womens contests, the Criterium was taken by Nadia Latzgo  with Ambre Levy and Zoe Mullins in the mix and then the Road Race on Sunday was Topview Staffer Samantha Heinrich of West Coast Cycling presented by STS Bikes /Harold HArt and Assoc.(Say that ten times fast) followed by Levy and Latzgo. 
Only two weeks until the big showdowns at San Antonio and Dade City.  Race For Humanity details here.

It is official... Veloce has agreed to be the OFFICIAL Jersey supplier of the 2013 FloridaCycling Bill Bone Pro Am Series.  The design is so nice and yet with a retro flair. These will be awarded at the Ocala Stage Race to the winner of the Overall Series. The rider in each category with the highest points in this best 12 out of 28 series will get to sport some new clothes!

If your team needs new kits for this coming season contact Juan at  VeloceSpeedwear