Ah Gastown….what a race. For the past five years Symmetrics Pro Cycling has been trying to win THAT race and every year has been oh so close. Finally in 2008 we did it in style. The guys put on an amazing show and Svein clearly won the hearts of the fans with his solo attempt at the win. Unfortunately for Svein he got swallowed up on the final stretch leaving Pinner and Zach to take care of business in the sprint. And what a sprint it was….Pinner won by almost two bike lengths over the likes of Chris Horner, Kirk Obee, Hilton Clark and a charging field pro cyclists. It was an impressive display of timing, tactics speed.

Zach was right there with Pinner throwing his bike at the line trying for second. In the end Zach got third behind Hilton Clark which put two of our riders on the podium. Combine that with Svein epic ride and that is by far the best performance we have ever had at Gastown.

Check out the press

Vancouver Sun - Hard-earned victory at Tour de Gastown

Vancouver Province - Pinfold and Grain take men and women's honours at Tour de Gastown

Velonews - Pinfold and Grain win the Vancouver stop of the USA CRITS Series

Pinfold, Grain pour on the gas for Canadian double

See our twitter feed from last nights race

Check out the photo gallery

The boys did a great job this weekend takin' care of business at the Tour de Delta. Each year the team has gotten progressively better at Superweek and this year they really put the icing on the cake. We won all three stages and the overall GC not to mention the $2000 crowd prime at the Delta criterium on Saturday night. Can you remember the days when Wohlberg and his Saturn team used to show up and do that? God we hated them! We hated them so much we signed Wohlberg! :-) Ok we didn't really hate them but it definitely inspired the creation of this team to a certain extent.

Results

Prologue

1. Svein Tuft
2. Andrew Pinfold

Criterium

1. Cam Evans
3. Zach Bell

Road Race

1. Andrew Pinfold
3. Zach Bell

Overall:

1. Zach Bell
2. Cam Evans

Press:

Symmetrics dominates Delta - Vancouver Sun

Pinfold, Benjamin ride to victory in Tour de Delta road race - Vancouver Province

Pictures:

Here are a few pictures from Greg Descantes

Here's a one minute one question interview with Jake and Pinner. The question - What's the non-bike thing you don't leave home without when you go to a race and why? (more…)

So as I predicted I didn't get too many questions but nervertheless I think the two I did get warrant some answers.

The Princess of Darkness asked:What is the deal with the lycra??? What makes a leg-shaving cyclist WILLINGLY don a pair of lycra shorts? No woman in their right mind likes lycra and yet cyclists flock to it like Pam Anderson to silicone. And don't try and tell me it is more aerodynamic. What gives?

A: In a word, wool. Lycra replaced wool as the fabric of choice for cycling apparel. Wear a wool jersey and shorts on a hot day and it becomes pretty obvious why we wear lycra.

Plus, it feels so liberating to parade around in skin tight stuff. Try it.

The next question come from Cranky Pants who asked: When you are riding in a breakaway and sitting-on, do you ever feel any regret and/or remorse for doing so? Or do you as the consummate pro just think "You poor suckers, I am going to rock you today!" Please discuss.

A: No I don't feel any regret or remorse, usually I am too busy thinking of excuses to tell the other guys in the break why I am not working.

Actually, I only sit on when I have to. When it benefits the team.

On a final note. I was asked the other day why we are not going to Univest. It's pretty easy, you need at least 5 starters and we only had 3 available (myself, Will, and Randell). Unfortunately, Z-Man had to go to track nats and The Young Man is doing Avenir, both for National Team duties. Furhtermore, Kabush is doing some big MTB race over in Europe (some 24 hr race or singlespeed thing) and Mash is on a bit of a self discovery tour.

For those of you who want to know what is up with the boys down in Ven. Apparently she's a doozy of a banana tour, even for banana tour specialists such as us. Getting off to a terrible start because of a 55 hour sleepless travel experience to get there doesn't help, followed Chavez's revenge (kinda like Montezuma's revenge, but the type you get in VEN) doesn't really lend itself to stellar results. However, there are 3 stages left and and you never know……….

As they say "Some time she goes, some times she don't go. She didn't go. That how she goes."

I've decided. I am not funny as Jake, I am not as interesting as Mark, and I really can't come up with anything that is remotely original (at least something worth blogging about). So I leave up to you. You know my mom, dad, and the other four people that read things I write. Ask me anything. Want to know how much Svein trains? How many sit ups Eric does every day? I can't guarrantee that your question will be answered, but it will be considered. So fire away.

As my trusty advisor would say: "Regards"
Pan Man

P.S. Post your questions in the comments section.