Race Report: 2026 Manhattan Beach Grand Prix - Men’s Pro/1/2

Race: 2026 Manhattan Beach Grand Prix - Men’s Pro/1/2

Date: July 12, 2026

AVRT racers: Jon Wells, Michael Bektas, George Wehner

Top Result: Jon Wells, 32nd of 101

Course: 1.3 mile hot dog blocks away from the ocean in Manhattan Beach featuring 2 u-turns and some small elevation. The long lap and lack of corners almost felt like a circuit race

Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/19288051197/ 

Nutrition: Pre race redbull plus a 100g bottle of malto gatorade

Race Recap:

Manhattan Beach GP is a California racing classic that has been around a long time. This year it was also serving as the first (ever? Or maybe just in a while? I’m not educated enough on my local racing history) unified California state championship crit. No Norcal and Socal champions, just one unified heavyweight title belt. And everyone showed out, making an absolute murders row of a start list. Luke Lamperti (world tour); Justin, Cory, Tyler Williams and all their Legion buddies; Marcos Mendez of Foundation; Multiple EF devo riders; Multiple pro studs from South America… plus all the usual Norcal suspects who had traveled down like cyclesport and Terun. Guys flew back from Boise twilight the night before to contest this race too. Given the deep field, plan was to maybe sneak into a dangerous move, otherwise field sprint since the money went 20 deep. This course historically is a sprinters speedway but last year a strong break of ~10 guys went on lap 1 and never came back. 

Race started very fast and didn’t really let up. Groups of 5 to 10 would get away but there were still so many strong dudes in the field unhappy about it that the group would bring it back. I think everyone also didn’t want to miss out after a break stuck it last year for the first time in many years. I started near the front and tried to sneak into some early moves and find a flow in the race.

Less than 15 minutes in there was a huge crash in the back side that took out Michael. As I saw the crash unfolding in front of me, I aimed for clear pavement to the left but the gap was quickly shrinking. I was already tensing up and preparing to hit the ground but somehow made it through the gap and didnt hit the ground. I looked back and was literally the last person to have snuck through the carnage.

After using my first of nine lives, I refocused and got back towards the front. The race was very aggressive and fast for the first hour when a move of 12 hitters snuck away. They sat at 15 seconds for a few laps and then the chase just gave out and the gap ballooned out quickly and the writing was on the wall. I joined a half hearted bridge effort as the group slowed the gap started going out but it went nowhere. At this point we reserved ourself to easy pedaling around for the remaining 20 minutes.

As laps started to tick down, I moved into position near the front of the group, locking on to Dante Young’s wheel, knowing he is good for a field sprint. Unfortunately with 1.5 laps to go, in the same place as earlier in the race, there was another crash in the front of the group in the same exact location where I used life number 2. Again snuck pack flying biked and looked back to see I was the last person in the front most group again. This time was inside free laps so there were maybe 20 people left in the field. 

Without a big team, we went slow enough for the group that got caught behind the crash to come back in the last half lap. I tried to be patient in the sprint since it is a long downhill and felt I was in a good spot but ended up getting caught up a bit with a teammate pealing off the front and had to go to the right side of the road (long war around) and catch some wind so I had a pretty un-spectacular sprint, coming in for like 15 in the field sprint and 30ish overall.

-Jon