Barnachea LBC Ronda virtual champion

ANGELES, Pampanga, Philippines  – Eastern Pangasinan’s Santy Barnachea floated with the peloton to this city yesterday, keeping him fresh for today’s short final ride to complete his 2011 LBC Ronda Pilipinas triumph.

The riders practically rode as one on this day where they woke up hearing the sad news of the passing of race marshal Rory Galising due to cardiac arrest.

Ilocos Sur’s Nilo Estayo, 7-Eleven’s Sherwin Carrera and Cebu’s Albert Basirgo finished one-two-three and settled for cash prizes of only P2,000 each from Angeles Mayor Edgardo Pamintuan as everyone decided before the race to donate the P130,500 stage pot to their fallen comrade.

“It’s a good gesture solely from the riders, not us, and we laud them for that,” said Ronda technical race director Ric Rodriguez.

“He’s (Galising) been a friend for 10 years now and we were surprised it happened. It was unfortunate,” Rodriguez also said.

Galising suffered the heart attack at around 4 a.m. at the Elizabeth Hotel in Baguio, and Ronda doctors tried to revive him to no avail. He was rushed to the Baguio City Hospital but declared dead at 5:20 a.m.

Galising, a first cousin of PhilCycling official and former two-time champion Cornelio Padilla Jr., was 43.

“As the organizing sponsor of the LBC Ronda Pilipinas and on behalf of the management of LBC Express, Inc., we would like to offer our sincere condolences to the family of Mr. Rory Galising, race motocomm1, who passed away early this morning due to cardiac arrest,” said Jocel de Guzman, head of the Global Corporation Communication of LBC, in a statement.

“We are in close coordination with the immediate family members to extend all the necessary assistance and support. The LBC management will be forever grateful to the contributions of Mr. Galising as motocomm1 in the overall success of the LBC Ronda Pilipinas,” De Guzman added.

The overall individual standings remained intact with 94 of the 96 remaining riders checking in with identical clocking of four hours, five minutes, one second in Stage 11 dedicated in memory of Galising.

In flashing to the finish first, Estayo savored a first stage win in seven years.

“It’s nice to win a stage again. It’d been a long time,” said the 35-year-old Estayo, a native of Pogo, La Union, where Stage 11 was flagged off, instead of Baguio, due to the slippery condition of Aspiras Highway.

Barnachea was happier as he moved closer to wrapping up a third tour crown.

No one disagrees the 41.4km Angeles-Manila final stage is just victory ride for Barnachea.

“Akin na ito (It’s mine),” said Barnachea drawing inspiration from wife Michelle, seven-year-old son Darren and four-year-old daughter Princess.

After 11 stages, Barnachea had an aggregate time of 36:19:32, more than six mintes ahead of Nueva Ecija’s Joel Calderon and Phl Under-23’s George Oconer, who had total clockings of 36:26:00 and 36:26:14, respectively.

Rounding up the Top 10 were Cycleline Extreme-Butuan City’s March McQuinn Aleonar (36:26:43), 7-Eleven’s Lloyd Lucien Reynante (36:27:36), Eastern Pangasinan’s Baler Ravina (36:27:57), American Vinyl’s Cris Joven (36:30:42), Tarlac’s Tomas Martinez (36:31:56), American Vinyl’s Rudy Roque (36:33:35) and the National Capital Region’s Frederick Feliciano (36:35:42).

American Vinyl, coached by former two-time Tour king Renato Dolosa, at 109:09:53, was way ahead of 7-Eleven (109:22:08), Tarlac (109:29:06) and Nueva Ecija (109:30:37).

The other squads in the top 10 were Eastern Pangasinan (109:54:13), Cebu (109:57:58), NCR Standard (110:00:33), W&C Pangasinan (110:04:17), Cycleline Extreme-Butuan (110:21:25) and Ilocos Sur (110:30:09).

The 12-leg, 20-day event is offering a total cash pot of P7 million with the individual and team champions receiving P1 million apiece courtesy of main sponsor LBC Hari ng Padala and backers Rudy Project, Air Asia.com, Magnolia Purewater, Versa two-way radios and Starlite Ferries, Inc. with The Philippine STAR, C! and AKTV as media partners.