USA Cycling Professional Championships, Road Race, Greenville, South Carolina - Greenville, South Carolina - BikeRadar

Road race: Greenville, South Carolina - Greenville, South Carolina km

Ben King is new US road race champ

Ben King (Trek-Livestrong) had to dig deep to stay away from the peloton (Jon Devich)

Ben King (Trek-Livestrong) has become the youngest rider ever to be named US road champion after a dramatic day's racing in Greenville, South Carolina on Sunday.

On the second day of the USA Cycling Professional Championships, the 21-year-old spent nearly half the race off the front and held a gap in excess of two minutes over a small bunch that was fighting for second, the sprint for which was won by Alex Candelario (Kelly Benefit Strategies), followed by Kiel Reijnen (Jelly Belly p/b Kenda).

"I just got permission to announce that I'll be riding for RadioShack next year," said King. "I'm sure winning this race will help a lot with my future. One of the things that kept me going in the final circuits was having Allen Lim and Jose Azevedo in the team car come up to me.

"I was trying to find all the motivation to keep going. It doesn't seem like it's worth it when you're hurting that bad but Lim kept yelling, 'you're making history, this is huge'. When I was on the podium I started to realise that I don't even have to shave yet."

King started the day in an early move that gained a maximum of 17 minutes on the field and included US pro criterium champion Daniel Holloway (Bissell) and Scott Zwizanski (Kelly Benefit Strategy). He attacked his breakaway companions over the circuit's Paris Mountain ascent on the third of four long laps and maintained a three-minute margin over the field during the final three short circuits.

"Once I was solo and still had nine minutes a lot of things were going through my mind and a lot of different motivators," King said. "My dad [Mark] and sister [Hanna] were out on the course so I was thinking about that. I started praying pretty hard after Paris Mountain and onto the circuits and I think my prayers were answered."

A small 25-rider field entered the short finishing circuits led predominantly by team BMC Racing riding for defending champion George Hincapie. The team received help from Garmin-Transitions and Kelly Benefit Strategies. Carter Jones (Jelly Belly p/b Kenda) launched an attack at the start of the first circuit but was brought back by the mad chase a few kilometres later. Chris Baldwin (UnitedHealthcare p/b Maxxis) counter attacked but he too was quickly reeled back in.

"I was able to not get dropped too much on the last time up Paris Mountain and I made it back up to the group," said Candelario. "I still had Neil Shirley there and he did what he could to help BMC try and bring Ben back but we couldn't.

"Andrew Bajadali got second last year to Hincapie and that was a phenomenal ride and unfortunately we were missing him today. We came here wanting to win but that is the way it goes. I got second today which is a good ride for the team. It's always nice to get on the podium."

King entered the road race having already won the USA Cycling Under 23 Road and Criterium Championships held in Bend, Oregon in June.

For a full report and more pictures, visit www.cyclingnews.com.

ROAD RACE RESULTS