Sunday, October 30, 2011

no gas

raced day 2 at the chagrin river 2 day cx extravaganza pb fast track cycling. Every year the folks who put this event on do a great job Just couldn't get going. I however, did not do a great job. Spent most of the race thinking, "how the eff is he soo far ahead of me, ?..." Fun race, but frustrating. There were a bunch of dock section and barn doors covering up the flooded ditches. These were very sketchy, potentially dangerous and I hope they don't return next year. Also, our car got stuck in the mud, we had to resort to filling the trench dug by the tires with sticks and pine needles. Managed to bend a skewer on the roof rack too. blergh On a lighter note the 'rents, the g/f and brother #1 came out to watch my mediocre performance, and then we got some Mexican at El Camino. Tacos make everything better.

fantasy cyclocross http://www.velogames.com/about.php yup I have a team

comments on pro cyclingcrozz: trebon is crushing it, we'll see if he can keep it going until January, Tim Johnson is having the worst luck in the world. And my favorite underdog, Geoff kabush is now unemployed, luckily he's Canadian and has free(ish) health-care.

next week's race is in Solon, and it's contending with the big UCI race down in the dirty 'nati, so with any luck the fast doods will be out of town. Flyer here.

Monday, October 24, 2011

azure sky

Blue sky (or not) II went down this weekend. At over two miles it was a fun course, and pretty long for this series. Rolling up to the race venue in the morning it was exciting to see the event on the City of Euclid electronic message board. I'm a bike fan of urban races. I live in the city, I don't have a car. I grew up in BFE, and though it is nice to visit, I don't really want to drive waaaaay oouut there to race a bike all the time. The tale of cyclocross coming about as a point to point race in Europe across farms and fields, is great but very situationally applicable. One of my favorite traits the US cyclocross, and the NEOCX series is the variety of locations offered. There are races out there in BFE and they're great races, and there are races near city centers and in urban parks; ultimately each provides their unique compliment to the series as is progress through the season.Somehow though, I tend to favor the re-appropriated city park races, no offense rural promoters,as its just one man's opinion ...what a ramble....

Having a single speed division that starts 2 minutes behind the normal field has completely spoiled me. Unlike past races the Blue sky started the SSCXers with the B-masters group.Over this season I have forgotten what mania the first lap of the race can be; with log-jams, pile ups, and getting stuck behind someone who can take a turn if their life depended on it. Starting with the rest of the B masters brought those memories back quickly, the entire first lap was a fight. ugggh.

2/3rds of the course was pretty plane jane grass crit, that was slowly turning into mud as the day went-on. The other 1/3 was some dry rollers in the woods, and a hellacious off-camber 100 yard wide series of mud-switch-backs on the shore of Lake Erie. The switchback had a 100 yard flat section that made a hairpin about face into a 100 yard stretch of mud on a 45 degree slope, which had another 180 turn at its end to a similar to the first part 100 yard muddying flat stretch. Somehow I was lucky enough to ride this every lap, and not burn myself up for the ensuing stair run up. Overall good course, great beer, and some jaw-droppingly awesome pulled pork sammies


"you can only race the people who show up" is a quote from zach(or james?) dieringer, after I told him, yeah I got 2nd but its because all the fast people are down at states. So for the first time in my storied 3 year career I ended up on the podium, and I was awarded a balling pair of super socks.

Monday, October 3, 2011

Stark Velo and Brooklyn CX

Stark Velo race went pretty well. My place in the single speed pecking order moved up by two, which I would say is a win. The course was similar to the previous year's, a grass crit course with long power sections, not too technical. Watching John Proppe win the A race was amazing. It was very exciting to see a new face shake up the other wise 4 usual names. Magz and I did Canton romantic getaway 2.0 by getting a room at the luxurious airport Hilton, and dinner at Bender's. Bender's was pretty damn good I would certainly go back there.

Brooklyn would have been the perfect race. It was beyond muddy. So thick was the course in some parts that long sections had to run. It was my impression and as the first 3/4 of lap one proved this was the course for me. Luck, however, had other plans. The Single Speeders start about two minutes behind the b1 group. The b1 is comprised of 35+ (age) B racers. These guys, even though technically are in a completely different category than the Single Speeders really fight you for every turn, and won't let you pass. Normally I start catching the b1 group about half way through the second lap. At Brooklyn we (the Single Speeders) were catching the b1 group half way through the first lap. I had a great position, and then my front wheel flatted. I don't bring spares to the race, so I was SOL. I rode my flatted bike a little further then gave up and walked. I was walking my bike back down the course when I was passed by team mate Guy Singer. He told me he was dropping out of the race. I said hey there gimme your front wheel, we'll trade. So he did, and in possibly a not so race legal swap I was back in the race.(we were near the pit, does that count? and my walking never cut any of the course) Only now, the wheel Guy gave me was too big to provide any good clearance, and my bike was too mudded up for me to get the front brake back on the cantilevers. I had to stop at least 10 times to roll my bike backwards and pick giant softball sized chucks of mud our from the my front fork to keep myself from endoing, and had to take all turns with one leg out, unclipped, as I only had a rear brake. The awesome folks at snake bite racing provided time splits per lap. I had a 14 minute first lap and an 11 minute second lap a 12 minutes third lap and a 13 minutes fourth lap (I wrecked pretty bad at the bottom of a hill on the fourth lap. Catching my breath and getting the rig back together took sometime out of me). boo