For their first event, I'd say they're doing it right. Good venue, good atmosphere, and a fun course with lots of variety. The weather was frickin' freezing, but fortunately not as bad as some races last year (cough cough HPCX). Good thing to, because that muddy run up would have frozen toes and feet very quickly.
Considering the muddy sections, I was planning on running my Captain CX until a last minute conversation with Roland, and 2 quick laps on the course. While there were some muddy sections, most of the course was fast and relatively solid. I took a gamble and went with the Tracers which turned out work extremely well. I'm slowly gaining confidence on their ability to handle some slippery stuff, and for the majority of the course, those tubulars just felt much faster. The mud was no problem, as the hill was a run up, and the deep stuff was very short.
Right off the start, I was riding in a decent position, until a gust of wind blew the course tape over and snagged my right shift lever. It yanked my bars over and with my bike getting jerked around, there was a lot of swearing coming from behind me. I then backed off, and started moving backwards in the opening lap. Finally, I got myself together, and worked on trying to catch the riders ahead of me. For most of the race I had someone in sight, and was closing in on the Bicycle Therapy duo of Michael and Dan, but came up just a few seconds short in the end. Joe had a good race, finishing 8th, and I rolled through in 12th.
The single speed race came right after, and I had just enough time to swap numbers (thanks Ryan), swap bikes, and start to freeze before we finally rolled off. Strange things were happening during the race, stakes moving out into the muddy lines, and the course mysteriously got to be about 2 feet wide in the "designated heckling area" despite their very vocal claims that everything was exactly the same.
I tried following Geronimo who was taking it easy after his 1/2/3 Elite win, trying to figure out how he is so fast. There is no trick, he is just plain fast. He carries more speed through the corners, accelerates harder, and has a significantly higher top end. Wow.
Considering the muddy sections, I was planning on running my Captain CX until a last minute conversation with Roland, and 2 quick laps on the course. While there were some muddy sections, most of the course was fast and relatively solid. I took a gamble and went with the Tracers which turned out work extremely well. I'm slowly gaining confidence on their ability to handle some slippery stuff, and for the majority of the course, those tubulars just felt much faster. The mud was no problem, as the hill was a run up, and the deep stuff was very short.
Right off the start, I was riding in a decent position, until a gust of wind blew the course tape over and snagged my right shift lever. It yanked my bars over and with my bike getting jerked around, there was a lot of swearing coming from behind me. I then backed off, and started moving backwards in the opening lap. Finally, I got myself together, and worked on trying to catch the riders ahead of me. For most of the race I had someone in sight, and was closing in on the Bicycle Therapy duo of Michael and Dan, but came up just a few seconds short in the end. Joe had a good race, finishing 8th, and I rolled through in 12th.
I tried following Geronimo who was taking it easy after his 1/2/3 Elite win, trying to figure out how he is so fast. There is no trick, he is just plain fast. He carries more speed through the corners, accelerates harder, and has a significantly higher top end. Wow.
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