The Tenspeed Heroes made an appearance at the 2011 Glencoe Grand Prix to catch the Elite Men’s and Elite Women’s Criterium. We arrived early and caught the start of the Men’s Cat 4 race where a few Heroes were being lead out by a silver pace car, the Jaguar XK convertible. Having such a status-oriented pace car suited the wealthy village for more than the obvious reason. If you are not familiar with the north suburbs of Chicago, Glencoe was the cinematic backdrop of Tom Cruise’s character in Risky Business and home to many scenes from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. The upper-class protagonists of those films found themselves acting out their youthful rebellion with their disassociated parent’s Ferraris and Porsche’s. Spoiler Alert: Unlike the Risky Business Porsche and the Ferris Bueller Ferrari, the Glencoe Grand Prix Jaguar survived the drama of the day (minus a random squirt from a water bottle and some hard braking).
After walking the circuit we ran into to a few members of Team Tibco-To the Top. A favorite of the Heroes for more than just their pink glasses, this Women’s Elite team has the reputation of coming to Chicago area aboard beautifully painted Look 585’s and winning races. Now they are on not-so-color-coordinated Specialized S-Works and they are still winning races. Two-Time Olympian Joanne “Jo” Kiesanowski, Emma Mackie and Carlee Taylor greeted us with smiles, handshakes and some 2011 Tibco posters for the walls of the Hero Headquarters Service Course. We returned the favor by sharing some less flattering pictures of their teammates and rivals from the Ronde Van Vlaanderen.
We watched the 70-minute crit from several corners. Carlee Taylor set the pace on the front for Tibco with Team Vanderkitten-Focus taking turns. This had the effect of dropping many of the local riders from the front group. For the most part it was a two-team affair, with the impressive Emily Collins from Vanderkitten-Focus taking all the primes. In the end it was Emma Mackie leaping off her teammate, Jo Kieseanowski’s wheel for the victory. Collins had the speed to power past Kiesanowski for second place.
Thanks to Jo, Emma, Carlee and Emily for letting us get some pre and post race photos.