Adam de Vos continues to burnish his reputation as the Next One out of the Island in cycling. The 23-year-old Oak Bay High graduate recently raced North America鈥檚 top stage race, the Amgen Tour de California, and returned home Saturday to win the 120-kilometre Schwalbe Road Race Classic in a sprint finish in Metchosin.
鈥淚 definitely want to race the Grand Tour [including the Giro and Tour de France] and am looking to make that step to Europe over the next two years,鈥� said de Vos, who rides for the U.S.-based pro Rally team.
鈥淎nd Tokyo [2020 Summer Olympics] would be awesome.鈥�
These big plans come from a former swimmer with the Oak Bay Orcas who didn鈥檛 even begin cycling until age 17 with the Tripleshot club of Victoria.
鈥淐ycling provides more fun and variety,鈥� de Vos said.
鈥淎nd I get to make a living at it. It鈥檚 an awesome job to have.鈥�
Nigel Ellsay was second and Connor Toppings third.
Meanwhile, Megan Rathwell of Victoria won her fourth women鈥檚 Metchosin road race title in five years Saturday with Janna Gillick of Nanaimo second and potential future track-cycling Olympian Maggie Coles-Lyster, 18, of Maple Ridge third. The veteran 32-year-old Rathwell said it was a 鈥渃at and mouse game,鈥� but she felt confident going into the sprint finish.
It is part of the Robert W. Cameron Law Cycling Series, which began Friday night with the Ellsay family of Courtenay sweeping the scenic EnergyLab Dallas Road Time Trial with Nigel Ellsay winning the elite men鈥檚 race in a course record and De vos second and Kyle Buckosky third. Gillian Ellsay, Nigel鈥檚 sister, won the elite women鈥檚 race with Coles-Lyster second and Rathwell third.
The signature event of the weekend of racing, the Russ Hay鈥檚 Grand Prix, starts today at 8 a.m. around the Parliament Buildings, with the women鈥檚 elite race beginning at 12:30 p.m. and the elite men鈥檚 at 1:30 p.m.
Past winners of the Grand Prix, which from 1992 to 2014 was held around Bastion Square with the infamous and hairy Crash Corner, have included Olympic medallists Brian Walton and Alison Sydor and fellow Olympians Roland Green, Andreas Hestler, Erinne Willock and Gina Grain.
