Spring Mount Cyclocross 2011, Crossasaurus Awesome

Two years ago I did the C race here, last year I raced the Bs (coming in 6th both times), so it seemed somewhat fitting to sign up for the A race this year. Fortunately, David granted me the Cat 2 upgrade last week, just in time to be able to sign up for the 1/2 Elite race.

I was a little nervous seeing the list of names on the pre-reg list stack up with some seriously fast people, and my originally very optimistic outlook regressed to not getting lapped too many times and try not to finish DFL.

The weather turned out to be ideal, partly cloudy, cool, but pleasant fall weather. We arrived in time to see Jeff ride to 10th place in a competitive Masters 35+ field, and then Jen take a very solid 4th place in the women's race, behind such powerhouses as Selene and others.

The Philly Ciclismo guys and gals always have a fun atmosphere, and this year was no different. Free food, plus a much improved course over last year, good work guys.

I had very little pre-race nerves, probably due to my much lowered expectations. I was playing head games and talking myself out of it before it had even begun. Surprisingly, I got one of the front row call ups (probably alphabetical), but there were only two rows in a relatively small field, so it didn't make much of a difference. Fortunately, as soon as the race begun I clicked out of mental mode, and into race mode. No room for intimidation.

As expected, the start was fast, and I slotted into a spot about in the middle. After things started to string out, I tried to move up as much as possible. Before the really wide open head wind sections, I wanted to try and get into a good position. I followed third place for most of that lap, and we continued to trade back and forth for most of the rest of the race. First place (Kincaid) was looong gone, but we could see second place dangling not too far ahead. I put in some extra efforts to try and reel in some ground, but he was still steadily pulling away. I felt really good for the first 40-45 minutes, but really suddenly, with about 2 laps to go, my legs started blocking up and I realized I was cooked. I lost his wheel after the sand section and just couldn't catch back on. It was a good gap back to 5th, so I just rode smoothly to finish out the race.

There can be a lot of head games in cross, so much of it is mental.

I ran about 20 psi in my tubulars, and could have even gone slightly lower in the front, but they felt pretty fast on the course. The Tracers clogged with mud quickly in those short sections, but it all flung off fast enough in the grass or gravel. Good, fast tires for the course.



Thanks to Craig Lebair for the photo.

The 60 minutes felt like a real shock after getting so used to only 45 minutes of race effort, ouch. That whole evening my body felt completely wrecked, I couldn't even eat for a couple of hours. I started to get the full color visual swirling precursors that sometimes precede a migraine, but fortunately it was a false alarm and after some unpleasantness, started to slowly recover. Two cups of emergency coffee may have helped as well, but it was still a few hours before I could eat any real solid food.

I'm definitely extremely satisfied with 4th place, certainly better then I expected.

Be sure to read Festa's account here.

Spring Mount Race Report

Last year this course was quite muddy, with a huge sloppy section of peanut butter mud that was a real leg wrecker. With that thought, and the memory of last weeks Fifth St Cross race (12+ hours straight of rain), I ran straight to Cutter's and bought a pair of Specialized Captain CX tires. It wasn't until much later that it dawned on me that the "2bliss" advertised on the tires wasn't 1bliss version 2.0, or a statement that these tires were going to make me extremely happy, but actually TUBELESS.

Cool, bonus. I had no idea.

So my mental confusion aside, and an extra pair of mud wheels just in case, I rode down with Greg and Roland to get there early for the "C" race. It was cooold, and the wind was really starting whipping up some frigid wind chill.

Greg decided to jump in the "C" race, so Lamprey Systems had a good showing with George, Roland, Greg, David, and Jeremy showing up. In usual Greg style, he took off from the gun and took the lead early. He was so far ahead of the next guys, that the announcer missed him on each lap, and called the guys behind him as the "leaders". Amy wasn't going to put up with that, so she straightened out the announcer for all of us. It looked like he was going to pull it off, but got passed right at the end by just a few bike lengths. Jeremy had a good race, pulling off a solid top 10 (7th?).

Although I had almost 3 hours to get ready for my race, I somehow managed to get to the line late, and barely got my call up position. Then, to top off my start, I had my number pinned on the wrong side. So I'm stripping off my jersey, trying to switch the number around, and dropping my pins into the rocks. Great.

Finally I was good to go (I think the officials waited for me, they didn't hide their surprise when I actually got the number on the correct that it was right side up). The start was fast and I came through the prologue loop somewhere between 10 and 15. After that it thinned out and I started moving up. I got up to the front with Joe and another strong rider. We had a great support crew cheering at the sand pit, so I decided to try and ride it, and actually got through. After the fast start, we settled down in the middle of the race and it didn't take long for us to grow to a group of 6 at the front. I wanted to try to keep the pace high so others wouldn't ride up to us, but the wind was absolutely killer and finding a wheel to sit behind was crucial, especially on the open back section.

Overall, I was happy with my riding, I was carrying good speed through the turns, my light weight was an asset here as I could take a tighter line with the same speed and make passes on the insides of the turns. I momentarily panicked as I burped a bunch of air out of my rear tire again, but calmed down when I realized it was holding, and as a bonus my bike felt even faster yet. I was bottoming out on the tree stumps, but the bike floated over the course and cornered great. What a difference. I probably finished with not much more then 20 psi.

I knew that if it came down to a sprint at the end with this group of 6, I wouldn't be able to really contest it, but trying some solo move at the end didn't seem prudent with the wind. Plus my right quad was cramping up and I didn't have much left by the time the last lap came around. In the end, I couldn't match the accelerations and rolled through for 6th.

But great racing; riding in the group helped with pacing, flow, and wind. Forty minutes never went by so quickly.

Philladelphia Ciclismo put on a great race, I liked the course much better then last year, and their food was awesome. The gusting winds blew the cheese off my chili, but it was still awesome.