EVOL Women's Boulder Roubaix

EVOL Women’s Racing brought their A-Game to the highly anticipated Boulder Roubaix road race and landed two podium finishes this weekend. The race paid homage to Europe’s spring classics with challenging dirt road sections and sharp, steep climbs. The EVOL women thrive on tough courses and Roubaix wast their first chance racing together in these conditions for 2015.

The day started with fierce tactical racing including several attacks by the EVOL women that successfully broke up the main pack in the first of three laps. Sprinter Christa Ghent went on a solo break early in the race and held over a minute lead on the main pack for nearly an entire lap of the 18-mile course. The field was forced to combine efforts to bring Ghent back, setting up a prime opportunity for another EVOL launch.

Kate Powlison was the first to jump, taking two competitors and EVOL teammate Kristen Legan with her. The group of four quickly got to work and put some distance between the break and the main group.

Despite an emergency detour and five-minute pause in racing for the break and main field - due to a structure fire on the course – the break maintained their lead and headed into the last lap ready to fight it out to the finish.

Powlison and Legan worked to drop the other two riders but were unsuccessful leading into the final three miles. A well-timed jump from Lucy Conklin of Rally Sport Cycling Team threw the EVOL women into chase mode. Despite their strong efforts, Powlison and Legan couldn’t pull Conklin back before the finish and they came across in 2^nd and 3^rd place.

Meanwhile, in the main group, EVOL continued to dominate the attacks and control of the peloton. All five of our racers placed in the top 10 with some stellar sprint finishes to wrap things up. Beth Fisk finished an impressive 5^th place, Christa Ghent sprinted for 7^th, and Margell Abel rounded things off in 10^th.

EVOL’s success at Boulder Roubaix was wholly due to the selfless teamwork from each member of our team. Thanks for the cheers and support out on course and special thanks the Ghents for working the feed hill.

We'd also like to say a big Thank You to DBC events and the CU Cycling Team for putting on a fantastic race and offering up equal prize money for men and women. We love supporting races that support women's cycling like this! THANK YOU!

Now that the 2015 season is well underway, the EVOL Women’s Team will be out racing most weekends throughout the season. Stay tuned for more race updates, results, and recaps!