{"id":33706,"date":"2023-05-27T19:04:13","date_gmt":"2023-05-28T01:04:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/classen-wins-ihbc-road-race-with-strong-descent\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T02:12:51","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:12:51","slug":"classen-wins-ihbc-road-race-with-strong-descent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/classen-wins-ihbc-road-race-with-strong-descent\/","title":{"rendered":"Classen wins IHBC road race with strong descent"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Caleb
Caleb Classen passes Howard Grotts as they descend Coal Bank Pass on Saturday during the Iron Horse Bicycle Classic men\u2019s pro road race. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A year after finishing second to Quinn Simmons in the Iron Horse Bicycle Classic\u2019s men\u2019s pro road race, Caleb Classen of California overcame some sickness to win the event in his second try on Saturday.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s definitely nice,\u201d Classen said. \u201cI wish Quinn (Simmons) was here so we could have a battle, but Howard (Grotts) is no slouch, so it was still a good race.\u201d<\/p>\n

Classen ended up winning the race in 2 hours, 7 minutes and 18.6 seconds, staying on Grotts\u2019 rear wheel for most of the race before making his move. Grotts crossed second in 2:08:56.3.<\/p>\n

Simmons won in 2:11:29 last year, but he was also working for his younger brother Colby and then attacked late when Colby started to slow.<\/p>\n

By the time Saturday\u2019s road race reached the halfway point up Coal Bank Pass, it was a two-person race between Howard Grotts and Caleb Classen. Jack Odron was a minute back riding solo in third place followed by a group of eight another minute back.<\/p>\n

The two cyclists helped set a blistering pace in the peloton and were at the front nearly the whole time.<\/p>\n

Grotts said he sometimes gets bored going slow through the valley so he helped get the group rolling.<\/p>\n

\u201cI struggle with saving energy for this race,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m happy we kept it rolling through the valley.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brian Husen, Joseph Bacala and Eddie Anderson were part of a three-man breakaway immediately out of Durango, but the peloton absorbed them around Hermosa.<\/p>\n

Grotts and Classen along with Vaughn Veenendall led a group of about 22 riders up Shalona Hill and the peloton stayed together as they flew by Purgatory Resort. Three separate groups with seven to eight riders each followed.<\/p>\n

\u201cHoward and Caleb were going to the front and thrashing; people were getting popped off the back pretty consistently,\u201d Veenendaal said. \u201cThose two made everyone suffer.\u201d<\/p>\n

Going up Coal Bank, Classen let Grotts pull him, then he made his move at the top, and the descent down Coal Bank ended up being the deciding factor in the race.<\/p>\n

\u201cHoward pulled me the whole way up and we dropped everyone else,\u201d Classen said. \u201cOn the descent I knew I could get Howard if I railed the corners and that\u2019s what I did. I was by myself and just went for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe got a gap on the descent and I couldn\u2019t catch him again,\u201d Grotts said. \u201cHe played his cards right today \u2026 I don\u2019t have the descending confidence that he does. I need descending lessons; I get scared.\u201d<\/p>\n

Odron finished third in 2:11:22.3, followed by Tayne Andrade (2:12:21.2), Jess Clapier (2:12:23.4), Veenendaal (2:12:39.5), Henry Nelson (2:12:39.8), Emmett McManus (2:13:07.0), Samuel Hart (2:13:32.6) and Fortunato Ferrara (2:13:37.7) in 10th.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was hard; it was a fast one from the very beginning,\u201d Veenendaal said. \u201cThere was a reduced bunch going up Purg, and then up Coal Bank, Howard sett an unreasonable tempo. From there it was just a race of attrition.\u201d<\/p>\n

Local legend Ned Overend finished 15th in 2:15:31.6, just over a second after Ivan Sippy in 14th.<\/p>\n

\"Caleb
Caleb Classen crosses the finish line winning the Iron Horse Bicycle Classic men\u2019s pro road race on Saturday in Silverton. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Jack
Jack Odron crosses the finish line placing second the Iron Horse Bicycle Classic men's pro road race on Saturday in Silverton. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

blistering pace and takes second<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":33707,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[13,28,2111,3743],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-33706","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-headlines","tag-iron-horse-bicycle-classic","tag-race-results-iron-horse-bicycle-classic"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33706","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33706"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33706\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":82311,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33706\/revisions\/82311"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33707"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33706"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33706"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=33706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}