Val-d’Or, QC (July 18, 2018) – Team Canada got off to a strong start at the first stage of the Tour de l’Abitibi, with national Criterium champion Riley Pickrell winning the field sprint, putting him in the brown leader’s jersey, plus the Points and Best Young Rider jerseys.

The 50th edition of the Tour de l’Abitibi began in one of the traditional host cities – Rouyn-Noranda – and ended 115 kilometres later at this year’s host city, Val d’Or. Strong cross and tail winds discouraged breakaways, and Team Canada worked hard to keep any dangerous moves from getting away in their plan to set up Pickrell.

The race saw a number of crashes in the final 40 kilometres, and missed one section as the lead police escort went straight when they should have turned; a mistake that shortened the race by a couple of kilometres but had no real impact on the outcome.

The peloton entered Val d’Or with half of the 150 rider field still together, while the rest of the field were broken up into small chase groups.  Three finish loops made no changes, and the final false flat straight became a drag race between Pickrell, American rider Eduardo Cruz De La Mora (Alterra Home Loans Cycling Team) and Taisei Hino (Team Japan). Pickrell went straight up the middle, with a speed the others could not match. Cruz De La Mora took second just in front of Hino.

“It’s an amazing start for the team,” said Pickrell. “Our team rode fantastically; we had a strategy where two riders worked early in the race, two worked later in the race and one was a sweeper on my wheel in the sprint, and it was executed beautifully. The wind was a big factor in the last quarter of the race and we had to do a lot of communicating to make our way through the field and protect ourselves from the crosswinds.”

Saguenay, Quebec, June 24, 2018 – The road race competition at the 2018 Global Relay Canadian Road Championships p/b Quebecor concluded on Saturday with the Elite and Under-23 titles for men and women awarded. First time champions Katherine Maine (Rally Cycling) and Antoine Duchesne (Groupama FDJ) won the Elite titles.

Athletes faced a tough 15 kilometre circuit in and around the town of La Baie, with each category racing between eight and twelve laps. Each lap included a steep one kilometre climb that proved to be the deciding factor in many of the races. The women raced 120 kilometres and the men 181 kilometres.

Each race became one of attrition, with the fields gradually being whittled down every lap on the long climb. In the women’s race, Maine was part of an early breakaway that was caught by the remnants of the field, and she again went off the front with a lap and a half to go when Kinley Gibson (The Cyclery) attacked. With both major teams in the break, there was no incentive to chase, and the pair quickly opened a 30 second gap. Coming into the final 200 metres, Maine jumped and easily took the title by a few bike lengths. Sara Bergen (Rally Cycling) won the sprint for third. With her win, Maine became both the Elite and Under-23 Canadian champion.

“Our plan was to race our bikes super hard and take advantage of the opportunities that presented themself,” said Maine. “Kinley [Gibson] attacked and I sat on her wheel. She rode the most incredible lap and I could feel my legs start to cramp. When she started to go, I knew that I had to go for it. I can’t believe this happened!”

The men’s race included European-based pros Duchesne, Svein Tuft (Michelton Scott) and Ben Perry (Israel Cycling Academy), plus strong North American teams Silber Pro Cycling and Rally Cycling. Duchesne and Perry were part of an early move that split the field in the chase.  The front of the race saw multiple riders join and get dropped, with only Duchesne and Perry consistently there. With the race down to less than 30 riders from 128 starters, Duchesne, Perry and Nigel Ellsay (Rally Cycling) finally broke clear of the chasers with less than 40 kilometres remaining. In the sprint, Duchesne went to the front early and held off Perry for the win, with Ellsay taking third. Edward Walsh (T-Palm PCW) was the Under-23 champion, finishing tenth overall.

“I really believed it this time; I felt really strong coming out of Dauphine,” said Duchesne. “I felt confident, but stressed and nervous, since I knew I could win it. I tried to put myself at the front so I wouldn’t have to worry about chasing stuff down. I was in every move all day long and still managed to have a little left for the sprint.”

Saguenay, Quebec, June 22, 2018 – The 2018 Global Relay Canadian Road Championships p/b Quebecor opened on Thursday with some familiar faces on the top step of the podium. Leah Kirchmann (Team Sunweb), fresh off the Ovo Energy Women’s Tour, took the Elite women’s title, while Svein Tuft (Michelton Scott) won the men’s – his 11th Elite title.

Held in the beautiful Saguenay region north of Quebec City, the out-and-back course took the riders on a twisting, rolling course with multiple climbs. The Elite/Under-23 women raced 25.14 kilometres, while the Elite/Under-23 men did 37.2 kilometres.

Kirchmann, the 2014 time trial champion, was one of the favourites, along with defending champion Karol-Ann Canuel (Boels Dolmans), Kirsti Lay (Rally Cycling) and Jasmin Duehring (Twenty20 p/b SHO-AIR). Riding her first time trial of the year, Kirchmann caught her minute rider, Sara Poidevin (Rally Cycling) – who won the Under-23 title – and finished with a time of 36:12.76, 8.12 seconds ahead of Canuel, with Lay in third and Duehring fourth. Rally Cycling swept the Under-23 podium, with Poidevin joined by team mates Gillian Ellsay and Katherine Maine.

“I’m very happy to be able to claim another title today,” said Kirchmann. “I felt super strong racing the Women’s Tour, but this was my first time of the season and I didn’t know how I was going to recover after the race and the travel from Europe, so I was happy to find that I felt so strong today. It was a really tough course, with climbing the whole way out, and then on the way back it was a headwind, so it still felt like you were climbing!”

In the men’s race, Tuft showed once again why he is the greatest time trialist in Canadian history, defending his title and adding to his own record with an 11th title; his last since he will be retiring at the end of this season. Tuft finished with a time of 46:38.26, 35.9 seconds ahead of Rob Britton (Rally Cycling), with Alex Cataford (UnitedHealthcare) taking third, 1:42.74 back. Adam Roberge finished fourth overall and led a Silber team sweep of the Under-23 podium, joined by teammates Nickolas Zukowsky and Adam Jamieson; both nearly a minute back on Roberge.

“I remember my first one, in 2004, so to win my 11th one here is pretty special,” said Tuft. “At Beauce last week every day kept getting better for me; I was really fatigued after the Giro. But after that and some rest, I knew things were good again; I felt that good old feeling again. I loved the course and thought it covered all the bases; there was a lot of climbing, a lot of wind, high speed sections … I think it was a real time trial.”

Competitions were also held for the Junior and Para categories. Simone Boilard (Équipe du Québec) won the Junior women’s title, while Ben Katerberg (TaG Cycling Race Team) led a British Columbia sweep of the Junior men’s podium.

World champion Shelley Gautier of Toronto won the combined T1-2 Trike para category, while Kara Douville (Team Alberta) won the combined handcycle category for Women’s H2-4 and Men’s H2. Charles Moreau (Équipe du Quebec) won the combined Men’s H3-5 category. In the Women’s and Men’s combined C4-5 category, Marie Claude Molnar (Équipe du Québec) won the overall title.  In the Tandem competition, Daniel Chalifour (Équipe du Québec), alongside pilot Jean Michel Lachance won the combined men’s and women’s category, with the team of Robbi Weldon (Macogep Argon18 Girondins de Bordeaux p/p Mazda) and her pilot Audrey Lemieux finishing as the top female team.

The Championships continue on Friday and Saturday with the Road Race competition, and conclude on Sunday with the Criterium.

St-Georges, Quebec, June 18, 2018 – Team Canada had one of its strongest showings ever at the Tour de Beauce, Canada’s premier UCI-sanctioned men’s stage race, with James Piccoli of Montreal winning the overall title and a stage, Ben Perry of St Catherines taking the Climber’s Jersey, plus winning the Team General Classification as the top team.

Piccoli had a dramatic come-from-behind victory, winning the penultimate fourth stage to move up from 14th to eighth in the overall standings, and then driving the breakaway on the final day with team mate Jordan Cheyne of Kelowna, BC, to take the Yellow Jersey by 11 seconds. Piccoli is the first Canadian winner of Beauce since Svein Tuft in 2008, and the first winner from the host province of Quebec since Jacques Landry in 1994.

“It hasn’t totally sunk in, to be honest,” said Piccoli. “The team’s plan in the final two stages was to make it hard, attack and blow the race to pieces. And everyone did an amazing job of doing that. Jordan [Cheyne] rode out of his mind for me, and all the guys were laying it on the line for me. It was up to us to ride in the break, and we did it.”

Two other members of Team Canada finished in the top-10 overall – Cheyne in ninth and team captain Svein Tuft of Langley, BC, in tenth. Tuft was the last Canadian to win the Tour de Beauce, in 2008, and is in his final season of racing.

Overall, Canadian riders had their best results at Beauce in recent years, with wins in four of the six stages, plus five of the top-10 finishers in the overall standings coming from Canada.

“It’s pretty awesome,” said Kevin Field, Manager of Team Canada. “I don’t think we could have hoped for anything better today. We knew that this last stage is one where you can really turn things over. So, we had a really simple game plan; we said ‘our game is chaos’ … just create as much chaos as we can and stack any move with our riders.  Today it just worked out; being tactical on this circuit doesn’t work, you just have to go from the start and be committed.”