Wilmar Paredes (Team Medellín) won stage 1 of the Tour of the Gila with a strong push on the final climb of the Mogollon Road Race p/b Grant County.
Redlands Bicycle Classic champion Tyler Stites (Project Echelon Racing) finished second, with Paredes’ teammate Walter Vargas in third. Team Medellín had three riders in the top five, Oscar Sevilla finishing just behind fourth-placed Heiner Para (Canel’s-Java).
“This is my first time racing Gila, I’m very happy and thankful for my team,” Paredes said. “I’m happy to have garnered this victory for them.”
Starting in Silver City, New Mexico, the pro men faced 92 miles (148km) to the mountaintop finish at Mogollon, a former mining community, long ago abandoned and left as a ‘ghost’ town.
Four riders got away by the mid-point of the race - David Gaona Vázquez (Team Skyline), Ignacio de Jesus Prado Juarez (Canel’s-Java), Alexis Bouchard (Team Ecoflo Chronos) and Alexander Marr (Rio Grande Elite) - and they built a gap of 12:50.
“I was surprised that we gained so much time, but the teams in the field had different interests and so we took advantage of the opportunity. “We tried to gain a little more but it didn’t turn out,” said Prado, who grabbed the top points at both intermediate sprints to earn the first green points jersey.
A trio remained out front, Marr no longer connected, as they set off toward the Mogollon climb, a 3.8-mile ascent with pitches up to 19% near the top. CS Velo Racing set a searing pace at the front of the peloton in the chase.
Once on the climb, the time gap plummeted to two minutes with 6km to go. Bouchard was the final rider from the breakaway at the front, with riders from Team Medellín and Project Echelon Racing putting their leaders to work to close down the threat. The EcoFlo rider was caught within four kilometers to go by a move that included Sevilla, Heiner Parra (Canel’s-Java) and Stites.
Sevilla gained the first advantage with an attack, then teammate Vargas took over. Paredes made his way up to Vargas, with Stites tagging along. This set up the final battle to the win for Paredes.
“On the climb there were quite a few Medellín guys with me which made it tough trying to mark all of them,” Stites said at the finish. “Ended up setting my own pace. He got me there in the end, but I didn’t lose any time to him so overall a pretty good day.”
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