Jasmin Glaesser wins Pan Am road race gold with gutsy sprint
Jasmin Glaesser had to wait every pedal stroke of the 82.5-kilometre road race to know she’d won for sure.
When she crossed the line, head down and half-a-wheel ahead of Cuba’s Marlies Mejias, Canada’s cycling queen at these games released an emphatic first pump. And a really big yell.
“It was the best feeling in the world, I can’t describe it,” she said after, through a giant smile.
Jasmin Glaesser celebrates after winning the TO2015 cycling road race.
The 23-year-old was one of the pre-ordained breakaway girls today, along with Medicine Hat’s Kirsti Lay who ended up 29th but created a peloton sprint for Calgary’s Allison Beveridge, who won bronze.
Kirsti Lay leads the pack during the women’s road race at TO2015.
In the five-lap race that operates like a team event, Glaesser and Mejias charged ahead at the beginning of lap four. Their move put them alone in front, eventually building a 75-second lead. Beveridge and Lay were content with being left in the chase pack, “Jasmin has such an engine on her we knew that if she could get up the road she’s crafty enough that she can probably outsmart the Cubans,” said Lay.
Jasmin Glaesser (right) and Cuba’s Marlies Majias sprint to the finish of the women’s road race. Glaesser won.
And she did. Glaesser made sure Mejias was putting in the work, knowing the Cuban was a strong sprinter. However much strategy was employed, it had to be plain old guts at the end. Glaesser began her track events nine days ago, winning a gold and silver. She added a silver in the road time trial on Wednesday.
Today the gas for her second gold and fourth medal came even through self-doubt, “I was really worried, I was really getting tired there the last 30-kilometres,” she said.
The Canadian road race team from left, Jasmin Glaesser, gold medallist, Kirsti Lay, and Allison Beveridge, bronze medallist.
With the men’s road race yet to come Canada has 19 cycling medals from TO2015, with champions in every discipline: BMX, mountain bike, track, and road.
