The Uling Road Race

Nino Surban, arguably the best mountainbiker in the country today, still owns RollyCabaluna's number. While Surban didn't show up in last month's race, which was won by Cabaluna, last weeks Naga-Uling via Toledo road race just confirmed that Surban is still the better rider than Cabaluna.

I talked with Nino after the race and he said that that was so many attacks early in the race and he knew he had to ride smartly since Rolly had five strong teammates with him while he was on his own.But the fast pace and the unforgiving "Media Once" climb decided the outcome of the race. With Both Nino and Rolly clearly the best climbers in their category, the rest of the riders were shredded off one by one and the duo left to duke out first place.

According to Nino, it was Rolly who made a very strong attack as they crested the last part of "Landing". Fortunately, Nino still had plenty of gas left in the tank and was able to grab Rolly's wheel. He then made a counterattack that left Rolly still a bridesmaid in their last three meetings, which incidentally, were all road races instead of cross-country (XC).

It is obvious that Rolly is a very talented kid but very humble just like Nino, but Nino, who has competed all over Asia and Australia, simply had more experience when it comes to racing. If this was a XC race, numbers wouldn't have mattered but in a road race, the more teammates you have, the more control you have over the race since your teammates can help you. Therefore, Rolly and his teammates were supposed to have the edge but they simply failed to put their plans in motion assuming they had one.

In cat B, TyreLambo finally had a breakout race after finishing third behind the very aggressive Ramon Espinosa and the ageless Boy Pagnanawon. Tyre is a very good climber and his unselfish attitude when it comes to racing sometimes denies himself of a high finish. His brother, Art, who works for VECO, also had a strong race finishing in 5th place. Race organizer Ome Rodriguez, who had a very disappointing KIA Ironlegs, found his legs anew and came in at 7th.

There were no surprises in cat C and D though as Ronnie Adlawan, a businessman from Minglanilla and winner of the Tagbilaran-Chocolate Hills stage of KIA Ironlegs, and Gary Fernandez, a retired shipyard worker, dominated their respective cats with their climbing skills. Alas for me, unless I can shed off even half of my fat storage, I can just dream of riding with Ronnie and Gary in Uling!

Finally, former baseball superstar Roger Clemens was indicted last week of 15 counts of perjury, for allegedly lying when he was subpoenaed by the US Congress in the Federal investigation regarding the use of performance enhancing drugs. I'm sure Lance Armstrong is feeling the heat these days as the same agents who have been doggedly doing the investigation are the same agents gathering evidence against LA in a similar case. So concerned is LA that he hired a former Bill Clinton aide and spinmaster Mark Fabiani, to be a part of his legal team. What is scary about this investigation is that there is no official word on what the investigators are up to except for the usual leakage to the press.For a control freak like LA, this is very uncomfortable!