Cyclocross Race
#2
Sunday, Sept. 29,
2012
Pojoaque Fitness
Center, Pojoaque
Race number two!
Although I didn’t attend the Pojoaque Fitness Center race last year, I remember
it vividly from the first year Kirk raced cross. It would be hard to forget due
to one unique feature: much of the course centers around a football field (as
many do), but this includes a two flight run-up of uneven stone steps
overlooking the field. One doesn’t forget that quickly, even if one didn’t
actually run it with a bike on their shoulder. Those steps loomed large in my
head as we drove to Pojoaque.
We were donating
coffee and bagels as part of our sponsorship of this year’s season, so we
picked up bagels from NY Deli (too expensive and only okay) and 2.5 gallons of
coffee from the DeVargas Starbucks (cool! they goofed and gave us the 5 gal
instead! Not cool! The lid doesn’t seal any more, and coffee sloshed out from
under the lid the entire drive up.) It was beautiful, clear and a little cool
as we pulled in to the Fitness Center.
The course was
open for pre-ride, so Kirk and I set off on our bikes to ride it through a time
or two. It started with lots of snaking switch-back on the grassy football
field, and the grass was wet from the prior day’s rains. And I mean wet. Wet grass sucks the energy from your
legs; it’s kinda like mud, not as dicey as sand. Switchbacks on wet grass made
for slow going, at least for me.
The first set dumped you out on the running track around the field, so
that was a great place to pick up some speed and/or pass, before re-entering
the grass for more switchbacks on the other end of the field. It was even
wetter at that end; some water even pooled in some areas.
Those
switchbacks led you to a long straightaway still on the field, running next to
the section of track you’d just zoomed up. A third set of switchbacks
(including one really tight double switchback) let to the set of barriers, a
third pass up the length of the football field to the last set of switchbacks,
entrance back onto the running track, and the last easy bit of fast riding on
the course. Exiting the track and navigating a switchback to the left too you
to the stairs.
To my relief
(and dismay) there was only one section of stairs included in this year’s race.
At the top of the run-up, one jumped back on the bike and headed off to the
right on dirt, to a slight descent, through some deep gravel, and onto a packed
dirt road. From there you began to climb. It didn’t seem so steep…at first. The
climb led you up to the Pueblo Governor’s house, past his driveway, and then a
descent down the back. A right turn on gravel led to a short little climb, a
descent and back onto black-top, and a 90-degree right turn into the Fitness
Center entryway.
Passing the
building there was a right-and U-turn to the parking area which sported a nice
big puddle. I couldn’t tell how deep the puddle was, or if there was a big
pothole in it somewhere, so although it was harder to navigate the climb up in
the sharp u-turn, I always went to the far right to avoid the puddle. Later I
learned it was faster and easier to ride the biggest part if the puddle as
there were no unseen dangers lurking under the water. Oh well. Another
90-degree turn, this time to the left, took one past the second pit entry and
back to the first set of switchbacks.
Whew. What a
course! So much wet grass. . . .so many switchbacks, some of them pretty tight.
. .then that climb on the back. . . none of it particularly unnerved me, I just
knew I’d be slow on the switchbacks, and wouldn’t be aggressive on the gravel
descent after the Governor’s house, especially hitting that right turn in
gravel.
I did figure 8s
in the parking lot while the 13-14 kids started the day of racing to keep
limber and get my body moving into the turns.
At the starting line of my race.
We were up next:
Women’s Cat. 1/2/3, Masters Women 50+, and Cat. 4 Women. This week I only lined
up with two other Master’s Women. About 8 Cat. 1/2/3 ladies were ahead of us
ranging in age from 16 to 60. About 10 Cat. 4 gals where behind us, many of
them first or second time racers. The first group went off, and we were 15
seconds later. I watched the other two gals take off, and I felt like waving
and calling “see ya!” I just am not that fast off the line. . . but I usually
make up for some of it during the course of the race.
The first lap is
tough. I find myself apprehensive, and take stuff slow, and don’t fall into a
groove at all. I remember passing Callum and Jerry at the finish line keeping
score, and calling out, “This isn’t fun at all!” as I went by. From there up
the stairs – not as bad I as expected ‘em to be – onto the dirt descent which
felt a little dicier than I’d anticipated, ditto the gravel leading to the dirt
road climb – the climb is one of my power points, so I pushed speed as much as
I could on the climb, breathing really hard at the top.
On the long
descent I coasted, hands on brakes at the ready, and certainly didn’t add any
speed by pedaling. To my surprise it all felt very solid, and was a good place
to catch a little recovery. I took the right hand gravel turn relatively
slowly, as I did on the turn into the entry to the Fitness Center. The climb to
the parking lot through the puddle took me off guard – much steeper and harder
to navigate the turn to the right than I anticipated.
With lap two I
started to settle into a grove, passed a few people, got passed by a few, and
started to figure out tempos in different sections. However, coming down the
straightaway on the running track and heading towards the soft dirt leading
towards the bottom of the stairs I came across a toddler – about 3 yrs old if I
had to guess – on the course, the mom standing off to the side. I was incredulous.
I yelled at the mom, “Get her off the course! Either she’s going to get hit by
a bike, or a cyclist is going to go down, and neither of those would be good!”
I couldn’t believe it. Dogs on the course are bad enough. . .but a toddler????
Finishing lap
two, I came down the descent on the back towards the Fitness Center entry to
see one of the Cat. 4 ladies on her side on the ground at the apex of one of
the turns, with folks around her. By the time it was all said and done, she was
taken off by ambulance with a suspected fractured femur and a good dose of
morphine. Yipes. That wasn’t even a section I had thought twice about.
By the time I
climbed the back for the fourth time I was deciding I wouldn’t mind if I got
passed, which would cut a lap off my race. I couldn’t tell who the race leader
was; I just knew that the person I had been playing “tag” with (I’d pass her on
the climb, she’s pass be in the switchbacks on the grass – but then she was
riding a mountain bike instead of a cross bike) was suddenly gone – we’d
reached the bottom of the stairs and instead of heading up them ahead of me,
she pulled to the side and let me go up first. Sure enough I got around to the finish line and Jerry called
me out, as I had indeed been passed by the race leader. I was done.
The littlest
little kids went next. Some of their bikes are the same size as the kid! They go
for it, too, many of them.
I volunteered to
help score the next two races so that Jerry could race. It is initially a
matter of writing down bib numbers as the riders race past, but when they come
in bunches it gets challenging. Moreover, as riders get passed, or have a
mechanical somewhere and you don’t know why they haven’t come back around it
gets challenging to keep track. It
was fun to watch the race from a different perspective.
The Cat. 1/2/3
men were next. It was a large group. From the opposite side of the track, I
heard a loud dense sound – it didn’t sound at first like a crash, but it was. A
couple guys went down right at the start, so we assumed that someone had tapped
another bike’s wheel. Later we learned one racer hadn’t gotten his foot onto
the pedal and instead got it in his spokes, and went down. A fractured wrist
sent the second racer of the day to the emergency room. Said racer is an
orthopedic surgeon no less.
Those guys rode
hard. They did the most laps of any group that day. Their race is an hour, and
they must’ve done 7 laps.
Right after they finished, Kirk’s group raced. As the
last race of the day, they often have the most spectators which is fun. And
they too go hard. They zipped from
the start line on the track to the first stair run up, coming to the dirt at
the base of the stairs like a bunch of hornets. Here most of them took a
different tactic than I: I rode into the switchback at the bottom, then swung a
leg over to dismount and run the stairs. The more experienced racers, however,
dismounted before the switchback and were already heaving bikes onto their
shoulders to do the run up – probably saving time over my method. There is so
much strategy to cyclocross!
Two guys who attended our cyclocross clinic came to race and did a good job. It was fun to see Chip and Tom race, and to cheer them on. Congrats on your first cross race, guys!
I heard there
was one more injury – someone got a deep enough cut on the chin to require
stitches – but I never saw anyone that fit that description, so I don’t really
know if that is true or not.
Kirk’s chain got
dropped twice – hard bumps and putting down the bike hard can both cause the
chain to jump off the chainrings. One time he was able to shift and pedal and
get it back on; I assume the other time he had to put it on by hand. He still
came in a strong second in spite of the mechanicals. David had a good ride,
too, coming in third. Jerry however said he felt flat and not so great. I can
relate; this course was tough with the wet grass, and I too never felt like I
settled into a groove as I did the week prior. Tove had a strong, strong ride
with, to my knowledge, no mechanicals or crashes.
In spite of all
the injuries, the weather was great, the hail held off until we were done, and
the SpinDoc crew had a darned good time. That’s ‘cross!
(We don't have much in the way of photos due to the fact that there are photography restrictions on the Pojoaque Pueblo; once we realized that, Kirk put the camera away. However, there are tons of great pics on the Dash for Life facebook page.) http://www.facebook.com/pages/DASH/258862347486719?sk=photos_stream
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