LARAMIE, Wyo. -- Ian Gray of Team Kaos/Nebraska Medical Center placed third in the Pro/1/2 field at the Dead Dog Classic over the weekend. Gray finished the three-stage weekend in a total time of 4 hours, 56 minutes and 37 seconds. Kevin Nicol of Tokyo Joe's finished 35 seconds ahead of Gray to take the win.

Chris Spence was fifth in the Masters 35-plus field, 26 seconds behind the winner. Marco Vasquez was just a few minutes behind in 11th. Dave Rogers was 20th in the Masters 45-plus division.

An early break went off the front in Gray's Saturday road race, and the peloton was initially content to let them go. When the lead reached nearly 7 minutes, Gray and Lachlan Morton of Australia bumped up the pace. Several minutes later, Blake Caldwell of Garmin-Slipstream and Michael Creed of Rock Racing attacked and set the race on fire. After five minutes on the rivet, only Caldwell, Creed, Nicol and Gray remained.

After summiting Snowy Ridge, descending and reaching the turnaround point, the chase group quickly dispatched the breakaway group and kept the pace high the rest of the way. With 1K to go, Caldwell attacked, shedding Creed and Nicol. Gray and Caldwell traded attacks over the last uphill stretch, but Gray couldn't answer the last one.

The Pro/1/2 GC remained mostly the same after Sunday morning's criterium in Laramie, and the final-stage time trial proved decisive. Nicol put more than a minute on Gray, reclaiming the time lost during the final 1K of Saturday's road race.

In the Masters 35-plus field, Spence finished the road race in seventh place, 20 seconds off the pace. The peloton all finished with the same time in the criterium, setting Spence up for a race-winning time trial. He did win the time trial stage, but because of time bonuses in the road race, it wasn't enough to overtake Eric Sheagley of Green Mountain Sports.