Mexico's P&S Racing team continued its dominance of El Tour de Tucson.
Hector Hugo Rangel of P&S held off a pack of teammates and Mexican rivals to win the 37th El Tour de Tucson. The winning time: 4 hours and 10 minutes 47.12 seconds.
Ulises Castillo-Solo of Jelly Bell took second place while David Salomon and Juan Magallenes of P&S finished third and fourth, respectively.
Jillian Bearden won the women's race for 106 miles. Beardon, who is transgender, raced Saturday for the Southern Arizona Gender Alliance with the purpose of promoting gender inclusion in the sport of cycling.
Beardon has worked with the International Olympic Committee and USA Cycling in the past to build policies that allow wider participation within the sport. She also founded Transnational Women’s Cycling Team, the first transgender cycling team in the world.
More than 7,000 riders took part in Saturday's race. Another 3,000 took part in Indoor El Tour.
The 34th El Tour was blessed by warm weather, even if wind held up some of the riders. The 106-mile race began a bit after 7 a.m. in Armory Park, with other distances set to start later in the day. This newest event in El Tour, the 28-mile ride starting in Marana, will begin at 1p.m.
El Tour is Southern Arizona's largest participatory sporting event, often drawing riders and fans to a loop around Tucson on the Saturday before every Thanksgiving. This year's event honored Denise Mueller, who set the woman’s paced bicycle land speed record in September. Mueller won last year's 75-mile race by .05 of a second, and rode today's race as part of a tandem.
