kirtland park cx

I never heed my own advice. Three weeks ago I decided to wash the mud off my cyclocross bike and hang it up for the season. Several days went by, and in those days I enjoyed the luxuries of a lazy non athletic life catching up on teevee, reading books I've been meaning to read, finally repotting some plants, and spending some much needed time with the g/f. With the exception of the daily jog I had pretty successfully made the transition to being sedentary, and was looking forward to some winter weight gain. However this did not last. By Wednesday of last week I decided that Kirtland Park would be my last hurrah! I didn't have much time in between Wednesday and Sunday to ride, and hadn't been on my bike since Halloween's CX race/alleycat boner-jam-a-thon. So I just focused on running, and decided I'd do the C race and call it quits.
Sunday morning creeps in, and my parents are on the phone with a sudden need to come see me race. I oblige them, and though I was planning on riding to the course, (since I only live a few miles away) they insist on picking me up. I inherently know my Dad will be late, so I preempt this by telling him to show at 10:30 (the C race being at 12); He then silently calls my preemption and rolls up to my apartment at 12:05. Which I can't complain too much about because I knew deep down that I should be doing the B race anyways; though I wouldn't be much of a contender I shouldn't cheat myself of the experience. So we get to the course, and I run over to register while my mom and dad get my bike out and walk it over. My dad is pretty quick to point out that not only do I have the muddiest bike at the race its most likely to oldest, and least geared. I insisted that I prefered the spartan single speed to the complexity of gear-tastrophe shifter, and then made a rather honest joke about not being able to afford that kind of set up anyways. This was then demonstrated almost case in point by comparing a nearby junior's cx bike that was for sale for $300, to my centurion tourer which I bought for $40 and "upgraded" it with a cheap ass pair of ritchey cx tires. I then warned my parents that this race was most likely going to resemble the races of my highschool cross country days where I was consistently in an all out battle not to finish last.

Lets skip to the race. It went pretty well, I didn't bonk in this as I had in the spin race, and I didn't wreck like in PA, and I didn't toss my chain like a Wendy park, but I was by no means quick. I think I benefited largely from the three potential run ups two of them stair cases, and the third was the terrace short double hill which I would ride of the first half but the second part included a short climb and a left hand turn, which were beyond my caliber. None the less the jogging had proved to be beneficial and it was in these areas where I many times dismounted and made my way up a place or two. On the final lap of the race I decided it was do or die time so after the final harrowing east end descent I kicked it in to the highest spin rpm I could manage and held that as long as possible. Unfortunately I think I caught more A class racers who were warming up then B class finishers. This overdrive sprint took my stomach for a whirl where I shortly after finishing proceeded to paint the ground with my breakfast. All in all, a fun time though. And it was nice to have people there cheering for you.

About thirty minutes after the B race I was sitting with Jay Karp. on a bench watching the A's mercilessly tear up the course which had not-so-long-ago given me a reaming. Mesmerized by their speed I whimsically stated that next year I would buy a license and next year I'd train every day instead of twice a week, and next year I'd race the whole series, and next year I'd get a real bike. Dan Polito. was quick to respond with "What do you mean? you already have a real f*in' bike!"



other notes: Turns out my parents know someone on the bike authority team, I can't remember her name but seems like she had something to do with coordinating the race.

and I took 10th place. a season best

knowing when to cut an run

Chagrin River Valley Cyclocross two day race extravadanza was this past weekend. I only raced the first one on Saturday. Not having a car left my subject to a friend and fellow racer, having to pick me up at 10:30am to drive out to the course. Not having any idea how long it took to do misfits styled make up left me waking up at 7:30. Not wanting to get makeup on anything made the morning awkward as hell. As it turns out it only took about 20 minutes, which left me with about 2 and half hours to eat some cereal and not get make up on anything. The latter I failed at repeatedly. There was nothing special about the race other than I had finally gotten my endurance level up enough to not feel like I was going to simultaneously explode both my lungs and my heart and croak mid lap; and instead had energy to challenge people passing me and control my bike through the really technical parts, of which there was a ton. An entire section of the course was dedicated to this gnarly mud rutted single track romp through the woods which was eating roadies alive. Every time I entered that part of the course at least one person in front of me hit the deck in a slow motion panicked loss of balance, leaving me to either go off course into the pricker bushes to circumvent their inexperience, or dismount and jump them. Which leds me to my next little tid bit of learning in my first season of cyclocross. Running seems to be damned important. I think a big part of why this race went sooo much easier for me than the previous few was that I've been running two days a week instead of training in the park or on the boring ass indoor trainer. Originally when I would dismount I could hardly go more than a few yards running and would get back on the bike more tired than before. And now after a few weeks of run/jogging I can trot with the best. Which I believe, in hindsight, is a strategic advantage, such as in situations of this muddy rutted single track course where I often had to run a good 15-20 yards before finding a good place to remount my 25 year old Centurion tourer single speed conversion cross bike. I don't know where I placed in the race, somewhere in the middle, but it finally felt like the first race at Wendy Park, just awesome.

Later on that day I attempted an alleycat downtown. It was to be a 2 manifest slug-out between Cleveland's messenger and fakenger finest. I made it through the first manifest in the lead group of three (including myself Guy S. and Jay Karp.) with plenty of time to spare, and 19 miles behind use, when I gambled on a lift bridge being down and lost. With about 20 more miles of riding to do, and being sooo exhausted I could hardly hold a conversation with my g/f on the phone while waiting for the bridge to come back down I threw in the towel and headed home. And entered Halloween night as The Shadow, most people though I was a 30's gangster or a vampire.

deciding this is the best time to hang up the cx bike, .500 avg of postive post race attitude is more the good enough for me