Cyclocross race reports (Page 4)

We arrived in Louisville about 5:00pm on Thursday after a 10ish hour drive from DC.George and I dropped our stuff off at my B&B then headed over to his place to do the same and then we went to pick up our numbers.Looking at the heat sheets there it looked like I was going to be on the front row for my heat, I thought this would be a good thing.

Later that night after Luke and his wife arrived it was 70 degrees and pouring down rain.About 4am our phones went crazy and tornado sirens started going off outside.None of us had any idea what to do, so the three of us went into the cellar to ride out a possible Tornado.Warning ended about 4:45 or so and we headed back to bed (later found out that the sirens go off all the time and we should have just gone back to bed)

We rolled out of the house the following morning and it was still pretty warm but starting to cool off.When we arrived we found they had bumped everything back 2 hours or so.Not enough time to go home since they said they would get started at noon and try to make up time along the way, my heat was originally set for 10:30.We decided that due to the mucky conditions we should get some mud boots to save our shoes.We found a Target not too far away and headed over there to pick up supplies.Turns out Target only sells women’s rubber boots, so Luke, Shane and I left with matching boots.The black and white tiger stripe boots were a big hit.Someone told me a 16 year old girl was missing her boots somewhere, the announcer called us out for them, and someone took my picture for a blog.

Moving the race back 2 hrs messed up my normal meal plan so pre-race meal consisted of a pulled pork sandwich and fries, just what I needed.

Finally time to race,

Started on the far left side front row. There were 34 starters so at the time I believe I needed to beat 8 – 10 guys to make it to the finals. Course was complete slop, 1.5 miles of mud. Horn went off and we took off. Right after we left the pavement there was maybe a 10-20 foot pond that sent water everywhere, the one bright spot of my race, I was in the front still after the sprint so I didn’t get a complete face full of water like the guys behind me.

Started on the far left side front row.There were 34 starters so at the time I believe I needed to beat 8 – 10 guys to make it to the finals.Course was complete slop, 1.5 miles of mud.Horn went off and we took off.Right after we left the pavement there was maybe a 10-20 foot pond that sent water everywhere, the one bright spot of my race, I was in the front still after the sprint so I didn’t get a complete face full of water like the guys behind me.

Then I started a slow movement to the back of the pack.I was not prepared for these conditions, never raced in anything close.In MABRA I’ve raced a few muddy races but we had muddy sections (never did well in them) then we moved onto drier ground and I would make up ground there.There was no dry ground here it was either deep mud or swampy mud, or just plain water.I had borrowed some wheels from Knight to try out here as my Fango/Grifo combo was not suited to these conditions.I never had a chance before we left to try them out and race morning I went to install them and found that there was no configuration I could put my brakes in that would not cause them to rub the tire.A very poor piece of prep on my part.Ended up 2^nd from the back in 33^rd.I have never finished any CX race that poorly, even with broken brake cables, rolled tubulars, broken derailleurs, getting off my bike multiple times to drink a beer and eat a waffle, etc.Wasn’t overly happy, never been more miserable on a bike. 26 minutes for 3 miles worth of racing.