George Street Challenge 2017 Results

The results are in!

George Street Challenge 2017

Note that Dubstoevsky had to enter this challenge under an alias, Patrick Warner, in the men's 50-59 age group. The name, cycling historians and enthusiasts of arcane lore will know, is a loose Anglicization of the name of the eccentric Franco-Teutonic cyclist of the late 1800s and early 1900s, Patrique von Bongwarren. 

von Bongwarren family crest

The von Bongwarren clan, the result of the unlikely coupling of an aristocratic Prussian family and a down-at-the-barricades Alsatian brood, might have faded into ancestral obscurity if not for the cycling exploits of Patrique, the third son of Klaus & Simone von Bongwarren. 

Patrique, at age 13, entered the 1893 youth edition of Liège–Bastogne–Liège (minimum age was 16 but young Patrique bluffed his way in), won the race, and went on to be an perennial power in the spring classics. Known for his raw bursts of acceleration on steep climbs, and for his voracious thirst for Belgian abbey ale (he filled his bidet with it), Patrique von Bongwarren was a colorful character as well as a relentless competitor.

At the start of the 1907 season, however, he shocked his fans and the cycling world by announcing his retirement from the sport. Shortly thereafter, he abandoned his inherited chateau, gave away his acclaimed wine collection, and moved to southern California to farm pomegranates. 

See George Street Challenge 2017 for the recap.