Cyclocross

My mountain bike racing season ended quite early this year. This means two things for me:
1) I'm not very fit
2) I'm not tired of racing
In past years, I've often hit fall feeling like I've dragged the family too many places too many weeks in a row and everyone is tired and ready to move on to soccer and football. Meanwhile, my body has been worn out and ready to sit and watch the afore-mentioned soccer and football.

But not this year, so I decided I try something new: Cyclocross.

For the uninitiated, cyclocross is basically a mixed-surface criterium held in a park, typically on grass, pavement, and/or dirt. It is raced in the fall, so bad weather is supposed to add to the fun, and since everyone is tired of riding, barriers are added to the course so that competitors must hop off, carry their bikes, then get back on (see video below):

Having never actually seen a cyclocross race before, I wasn't entirely sure how it was all going to go, but the race was 5 minutes from the house and the weather was, well, cyclocrossy, so lacking any excusses to find something warmer to do, I drove down and signed up.

After one race, I'm a fan for several reasons. First of all, watching the races was actually fun. Kim and the kids showed up just before the start of the race, and there was so much more to watch than at most bike races. On this particular course, the riders passed one spot three times on every lap, and the laps were only 5 minutes or so. Spectators could actually follow the race. Of course the kids also had fun this time because they played in the mud.

Second, the riding was fun. Although the weather was chilly and very wet, the mixed-terrain riding is pretty slow compared to normal road riding and there were no real downhills so it wasn't like MTB where you cook on the climbs and freeze on the descents. The course was twisty and interesting, and the the run (if you call it that) definitely breaks things up. Additionally, it was not like a criterium where everyone coasts around afraid to attack for an hour, sprints 45 seconds, and the race is over. Instead people pushed the whole time ... hard. Drafting was not much of a factor (and very unpleasant anyway because of the water-roost coming off the tires), and technical riding ability did matter. Like I said - fun.

Third, it didn't take all day. I like the backcountry venues for cross-country racing, but it is time-consuming. This made for a nice fall mid-day activity.

The new bike worked great and I felt at home on it pretty quickly. I wasn't so sure how it would go since I built it Friday and hadn't even ridden around the block yet, but the sand and rain broke the brake pads in quickly.

One non-ideal issue was I had no idea where I was in the race. I'm usually not so good on fast starts (or short races for that matter), and since I didn't know what I was doing, I just started in the back. They started the 'A' women 90 seconds and the single-speeders 30 seconds ahead of us, and between passing everyone in my group and the other two groups I just had no idea. By the end I thought I must be near the front because I was passing fewer riders. They had a little sign that showed how many laps you had left at the start/finish line, but I didn't realize what that was until the race was over, so I wasn't really sure if the race was indeed over when I finished. I would have busted a little harder on the last had I known, but I was tired anyway.

In hindsight I probably should have raced the 'A' group rather than 'B', but with my lack of experience or training, I didn't want to get in everyone's way. I still don't know where I finished, but I didn't kill them or anything. Kim thinks I got second behind Chris Sherwin (whom I didn't know was even racing). Anyway, I wasn't that worried about it. I admit it was a little hard to watch the 'A' race and cheer on all the guys I race with all summer and not be up there with them, instead riding slower in the Bs, but this race was an experiment and maybe I'll get more training in through the fall and race faster. Maybe not. Don't have time for everything.