Paramount Racing's 2006 Criterium

The Paramount Criterium held at the usual location in Carson, Ca. turned out to be a big success. 667 entries proved to be the most of any race so far this year. Luckily the heat wave broke and the weather was near perfect for the event.

The racing started at 7:00 am with 8 junior categories and 52 racers. United Cycling Club has come on strong this year and gained dominance over Major Motion and SDBC. UCC won 5 of the races with SDBC 2 and MM 1. Josh Courtney of UCC led the squad with a win in the biggest field (15-16) and then came back later to finish in Men Cat 3 and he is only 15!

In 55/60+ action saw the largest total field ever seen including Manhattan Beach last year. 2 former Olympic riders, current National Champ Robert Paganini and all of the current top riders saw aggressive action. This race was sponsored by club member William Langstaff, DDS. The field lapped the women 3/4 3 times. Paramount Pres John Mckee had the best finish of a team member with a 3rd place finish in cat 60+.

The women 3/4 were sponsored by former team coach Ken Snowden and Endurancecoaching.com. Ken just fractured his pelvis in a cycling accident and I am sure I speak for everyone in wishing Ken a speedy recovery. The W 3/4 race was also part of the Women's Cycling Challenge.

In women Pro/1/2/3 the action was longer than almost all of the criteriums around the southland and the gals loved it. Great feedback from the women racers. The winner was Anna Webb of SDBC. This race was sponsored by Jax Bicycles and the added sponsorship gift certificates brought out the largest field of the year.

The 30+ 1/2/3 saw the final race of the Masters Cycle League. The action for the title saw the race really heat up. MCL originator Brad House was very pleased with the turnout. Karl Bodine of Labor Power won the race.

The 35+ 3/4 race saw the next best finish by a Paramount racer with race director John Bergman finishing 6th. The 45+ race was sponsored by United Site Services and saw complete dominance by the Sonance team. Sonance is just back from Masters Natz with many gold,silver and bronze medals. Sonance had 5 of the first 6 places including 1 thru 4.

The next to the last race of the day saw a sell out field of 125 racers in the Pro Men 1/2/3 event. The purse was pumped up by a generous donation from OCW. The racers went flat out the entire time. The race was won by Pro rider Hilton Clarke of Navigator Insurance.

The last race of the day was men 4/5 and there was no crash like the prior years event which saw 30 riders or more go down. Every one of the volunteers was quite pleased when it was finally over. It was a long day for a tired and hard worked crew of vols and officials. SCNCA president Eric Smith said it was a "great race" and we can be proud. That's all for now folks!

From the President:
First off I want to thank all the Paramount members that volunteers and worked very hard at this race to make it such a overall success. There were 667 total entries and sold out 3 fields including the Men Pro/1/2/3 with 125 racers.

Thank you to all the racers that came out and made many of the categories the largest fields of the year. This was the biggest race so far this year. Eric Smith president of SCNCA said it was a "great race". One of the best of the year.

Thank you to all the category sponsors and prime sponsors that gave money, gift certificates and product to make it a worthwhile and fun day. I hope all of you, the racers, enjoyed it and will come back next year. We have big plans to make it bigger and better. Stay tuned and thank you for coming out.

John McKee
Paramount President