I was still a little tense/serious for about the first hundred yards and then I discovered that when the course designer says "off-camber turn," they mean OFF-FREAKING-CAMBER! Nothing like a hairpin turn on wet, crushed grass that falls away from you. I almost ended up in a hedgerow and then spent the rest of the race giggling to myself. Lots of long straight hills on a lot of the course. I spent most of my time in my granny gear and my three largest cogs. Long, shallow, cold water puddle - um, go around that. Boards! Good thing I practice the shoe-less flying dismount. Managed to hop off my bike, picked it up to carry it over the two sets of boards, put the bike back down and jump back on. Lots of turns, bumps, berms, rocks, grass, etc. - a little bit of everything indeed. There was a short, steep hill going up to the sandpit at the end of the loop. I tried to ride up it but almost went rolling down the hill backwards from lifting my front wheel right off the ground. Then I remembered that they call these spots "run-ups" - gee, how about I try to run it. That worked much better. I walked my bike through the sand pit and jumped back on to finish my first lap. WOW! The race leader was fast. The leaders did two laps to my one lap. Second lap much like the first, but now my legs are burning and I'm going mostly on autopilot with my legs so that I could try to get a better line around some of the turns on the second lap. The whole way through the race there were spectators everywhere! Cowbells! Cheering! It was definitely cool to soak it up. I did managed to find both of the unmarked groundhog holes on my second lap. Thankfully I was only going 4 mph up the hill, so I didn't crash. Let's say it was more like a "your seat's too high" sort of moment and we'll leave it at that. I didn't even make it up any of the big hill on the second loop, so I walked that. Remounted and went around the big puddle again. As I passed one of the lap counters, I asked him "So, what's that, like 4 or 5 laps for me now?" He just laughed and shook his head :) "Keep it going big guy, the races leaders are about a lap behind you then" was his only response. Actually, much like a triathlon, the really fast people tend to cheer people on as they pass. Very cool environment. But back to the race. When I got back to the grassy run-up before the sand pit, I dismounted, shouldered my bike and jogged up it, then had to walk across the sand pit. As I cross the finish line, the lap counter was showing one lap to go. I went a little bit further, dismounted and jumped the tape to leave the course. I almost did my final lap, but I'd still have a few minutes to go before they needed to start the next race, so I pulled myself off the course to not hold things up for the rest of the day and walked over to the judges table so that they could get my number. I stuck around a few minutes to cheer everyone finishing their race and the start of the next one. OMG, never has this much discomfort been so much fun!

Course layout:


Not much. It was my first 'cross race and I treated it like the learning experience that it was. I had a lot of fun and learned a lot.

Ride to my car and change.


Lose 80 pounds - my steel cross bike weighs enough :)


Very well run race from what I could tell. The staff and competitors were friendly, cool and very laid back.