In The Words of Benjamin Sharp....

To keep everyone back home updated as soon as possible, the following summaries were written by Benjamin Sharp during the races......

Today was the opening stage of the GP-Ruebliland in Lenzburg , Switzerland . The course this afternoon was a 99.1km circuitous route that started and finished in Roggliswil. The day started with breakfast at the hotel, a light ride, and lunch at the SportHall in Lenzburg. Next, we loaded up into the van and car for Roggliswil. 106 riders took to the road at 3 p.m. Our plan was for Nolan Froese and Taylor Kuphaldt to patrol the front of the race for the first 50km, making sure that nothing slipped up the road without a U.S. rider. Froese made it into what became the move of the race, of 18 riders. Our aggressive young riders tried several times to bridge across to the swelling break but the Belgians (5 riders) and French (4 riders) dragged the large breakaway to a maximum lead of 5 minutes before alternately attacking the bunch and splitting the group. Nolan was caught out and relegated to what became the 3rd group on the road. He continued to drive the pace of his bunch to limit the time loss to the Czech winner, Marek Benda. He managed a 14th place finish, losing 1:34 in the final 15km. Taylor Kuphaldt slipped off the front in the closing kilometers to finsih 25th (5:23). The rest of the team came in with the main field, 5:39.
Currently the team is 6th on GC with three stages to go:
A 60 km circuit race, a 6km TT, and a 94.5 km Road Stage on Sunday.

The 2nd stage proved to be challenging, even at 60km. Immediately the field split with Joe Kukolla being caught out. He fought hard though, to stay within 7 min. At the finish. Belgian Joshua Soberon and Frenchman Dimitri Le Boulch rode away from the field just 20km into the race. They were able to stay clear until the finish. Our team finished in the main bunch with Van Horn coming across the line in 8th place. Froese's 14th on gc was preserved for the time trial.The 6km tt started with a 1km climb up to a plateau. The riders then race atop the plateau for 3.5km before dropping back into the star/finish toen of Villmergen. The course was tamed by Polish strongman Matheusz Czajkowski who won by 8 seconds over Belgium's Yannick Eijssen. Taylor Kuphaldt was the highest place American in 11th. The other riders finished strong with Larry Warbasse (24th), Grant Van Horn (27th), Travis Burandt (28th), Nolan Froese (37th) representing the team well.Today was the final stage of the GP Ruebliland. The riders completes a 94.5 km stage on rolling roads in the area around the town of Schneisingen. The race was aggressive from the beginning with small groups only able to eek out gaps of about 20 seconds before being reeled in. Finally with 40km to go, Van Horn was able to slip away with one of the Swiss regional riders. They were joined by 5 others including a Norwegian, French, Belgian, and Swiss regionals, and amssing a gap of 1:15 with 5km to go. The last 5km were touch and go with riders taking turns attacking the bunch. Nevertheless the breakaway came into the 500m uphill sprint in tact. Van Horn sprinted strongly but was just pipped at the line to take 2nd on the stage. (I told him before the race to get the flowers and kiss the (podium) girl. He did just that, enjoying time on the stage with two Swiss regional teammates. GC results are forthcoming but the rest of the guys were able to stay in the bunch to maintain Froese's top-15 position.Now we are en route to Izegem.