“It was a really fun race,” Kiesanowski said. “It’s really beautiful up there, and the courses are really challenging. Meredith was awesome, and it was great to have a teammate to ride with up there.”

Within the first 30 or so kilometers of the first stage, it became apparent that this would be a three-women race, with Rebecca Much (Webcor) providing the main competition.

“The first stage started at about 8,500 feet of elevation, descended to about 7,500 and then climbed up to over 10,000 feet,” Kiesanowski said. “Within a few kilometers of the first climb, it was just the three of us riding together. On the descent, Rebecca and I got away and we worked together toward the finish. The last 11 miles was really hard, with rolling climbs all the way to the finish, plus a solid cross headwind.”

The two rivals worked well together, but with 8 km to go, Kiesanowski attacked and opened a gap to Much and kept adding to it, finally finishing nearly three minutes ahead of the Webcor rider, while Miller rolled a little over two minutes further in arrears.

The TIBCO duo went into Sunday morning’s crit looking to get Miller closer to Much ahead of the Sunday afternoon time trial in hopes of overtaking 2nd place in the race against the clock.

“Our plan was to try to get me away to pick up some time on Rebecca before the time trial,” Miller said.

With time bonuses also available out on the road, Miller went on the attack early with one other rider and opened a solid gap. Much was forced to chase Miller to keep her gap to the 3rd place rider.

Kiesanowski played it perfectly. “Jo counter-attacked when I got caught,” Miller said. “Rebecca had to let her go because she was pretty gassed from chasing me.”

The New Zealander went solo for the final seven laps to earn the win by more than 20 seconds. Behind her, Miller sat in and recovered for the closing laps, and on the back stretch, attacked Much to take 2nd place on the stage and grab some extra bonus time.

Kiesanowski closed out a perfect weekend by taking the time trial by three seconds over her teammate. Much experienced some bad luck out on the road, flatting near the mid-point of the course, without neutral wheel support. She was forced to ride the remainder of the TT on the flat, and relinquished 2nd overall to Miller.

“We felt really bad for Rebecca,” Kiesanowski said. “I don’t know that she’d have finished ahead of either of us if she hadn’t flatted, but she probably would’ve held 2nd overall.”

In an act of sportsmanship, the TIBCO duo gave Much an additional share of the prize money.

Beveridge wins Canadian U23 time trial championship

Julia Beveridge won another Canadian national championship Saturday, this time taking the U23 time trial championship. She covered the 20km course in a time of 29:58, nearly 0:52 faster than the second place rider. Her time would have placed her second in the elite woman’s time trial.