Cyclocross Race
#7
Saturday, Nov. 17,
2012
SY Jackson
Middle School; Albuquerque, NM
Night Cross! Night
Cross was my first ever cross race last year on my trusty hard-tail Breezer. I
was definitely looking forward to trying it this year on my ‘cross bike.
So here’s the
scoop with Night ‘Cross. It is against regulations to have any lights on the
bike; the first year Kirk raced it, we’d intended to put this big light array
on his rear wheel which creates different shapes as the wheel spins – but found
out it wasn’t permissible. Instead, the course is lit with those huge lights
such as the ones road crews work under when working at night. They are pretty
powerful, and the only section that was a little dark on the course was the
turnaround at the top of the school driveway. Other than the optical illusions
the blue color of the tape caused the visibility was good. The blue tape was a
problem for me; several times I thought the tape was further away, or continued
straight when in fact it was straight across in front of me marking a turn.
Ramleen covered
the two morning classes so we wouldn’t expend it all before we even left town;
we worked at the shop until about 3 then headed to ‘Burque. It was nice out,
mild as the whole winter has been so far. Nonetheless I had an overflowing backpack
of garment choices, determined not to repeat my Cuba clothing mistake.
We got there as
the juniors were racing. That let us see the course with riders on it; this is
helpful in determining the direction you ride on certain sections, and if you
follow one rider you get a sense of the course overall. It appeared to be
pretty similar to last year, except there was more in the bark mulch under the
swing sets (there was just a single crossing of it last year), and the deep
short “sand box” (probably a tether ball area) was completely eliminated this
year. Last year’s course included riding off and back up quite a few concrete
lips and curbs; most of those were taken out this year. Fine by me; that was my
only concern as I haven’t mastered lifting the front of the cross bike (something
I find much easier, if only psychologically, with a suspension fork).
Although it was
warm I still donned a long sleeve base under my SpinDoc jersey and full leg
warmers tucked under my SpinDoc shorts. At least I could wear ‘kit;’ last weekend
was so cool I wore a long-sleeve jersey, not even my SpinDoc stuff. Kirk and I
got to pre-ride about ¾ of the course . . .then it was time to line up. Little
did I know that Tove, on her pre-ride, had gone over her handlebars after
hitting a hole in the grass (possibly a sprinkler, we don’t know) and had sprained
her hand. She was at the starting line for the Cat. 1/2/3s, so I was none the
wiser.
Anne Keener,
however, still was recovering from her injuries from Cuba and remained on the
sidelines. I didn’t get a chance
to talk to her, but it was great to see her manning the chili cook-off and wave.
The start was my
norm, not really getting much of a jump on it, but picking up some speed –
enough to not get dropped – as I made my way up the initial parking lot section
over speed humps and speed bumps. Just like last year, a sweeping
mini-roundabout turned us back towards the grass, and a fairly straight entry
onto the grassy field enabled you to keep up quite a bit of speed. I took that
segment of each lap faster and faster, once kind of forgetting until the last
moment that it ended in a right turn. The right turn led up a short little
climb, steep enough to force you to quickly shift down one or two, into a tight
switchback and a return down to the main section of field.
Back and forth
we crossed over the field, eventually taking another climb back up, steep
enough that I often had to stand as I rode up to maintain any speed. That led
to the bark section, winding in between rows of swing sets. The first time I
tried to ride it. I was right behind a lady named Maripat, also a Masters 50+
racer, and a Cat. 4 rider. I did okay until the first switchback in the bark,
and went too wide into deeper stuff, losing time and struggling to get going
again. I finally did, but was stuck behind the Cat. 4 rider and saw Maripat
pulling away from me. The second
switchback in the bark resulted in even further delays, and I finally got off
and ran my bike the third leg of the bark, remounting once I was back on
blacktop. From there a quick diagonal cut took you to the bottom of a run-up,
wide shallow stairs that led up to an easy switchback on concrete at the base
of the school building. That
u-turn put us back on grass on a long straight run, off-camber, with switch
backs, the middle of the three pretty tight (but I made it on every one of
those!). The last dumped you on a bit of concrete, and was a good place to spin
it up while catching your breath.
The next segment
caught me off guard several times, and actually caused Kirk a get-off: from the
concrete we turned left to a u-turn around a tree with some surprisingly stable
sand underneath. The tricky part was the line of blue tape marking the turn. As
dusk fell it was harder and harder to see. The first lap I nearly rode straight
into it, missing it altogether until the last second and making the turn. From
then I always warned myself it was coming yet it still often caught me by
surprise.
Another couple
switchbacks on grass brought us a dicey soft sand switchback that I never
managed to navigate without at least a foot down. Another stair run-up took us
back to the upper level where the bark was, but you immediately turned right
and rode another couple of tight switchbacks, heading back down the hill we’d
just gone up via the stairs. More and more switchbacks – another sea-sick
course – finally took you past the second side of the pit and to the barriers.
Kind of hard to get a clear photo in the dark. . .
Ah, but there
was more! After jumping the first pair of barriers, you rode past the finish
line, took a left into a sand box (possibly a long jump pit?), jumped another
barrier, and then jumped up onto a concrete curb that must’ve been at least 12”
high. That was one of the two hardest points for me. Not only had I always
knocked my pedals into the wrong position for a quick remount and start, but I
was simply tapped. From there we picked back up on the start in the parking lot
with the speed humps and bumps.
I think it was
towards the end of lap two that I caught back up with Maripat. I had gotten to
the bark and decided it might be faster for me to run the whole thing. I rode
it to the first switchback, then dismounted and ran the rest. It definitely
proved quicker for me. My transitions to the stairs were uniformly fast and smooth;
my dismounts have improved quite a bit, and I never had a problem moving into
picking up the bike and running. The top of that first set of stairs was the
other heavy breathing point for me, and a couple times fumbling for the pedals
while trying to catch my breath cost me some time.
But I was
closing in on her, and knew it. On that last straight away through the finish
line leading to the sand box/second barrier I passed her, made the barrier just
fine, but was caught and re-passed as I fought for breath and my right pedal on
the concrete. Starting lap three, however, I passed her for the last time and
held my gap. I said something silly as I passed her, something about a
ridiculous moment back there where I was unable to get rolling, but she didn’t
respond.
I pulled off,
and subsequently rode each lap faster with three more to go. It was a surprise
when they said three more, and I wondered if I could keep it up. I did, though,
and had a great race, even back tracking a couple steps where tape had gone
down and I missed a switchback. (I didn’t wanna be disqualified if I missed
part of the course by accident, but I couldn’t tell where it went once the
section of tape went down. I saw a Cat. 3 rider properly navigate the original
course even without the tape up, and followed her lead to correct myself.)
After the race I
was heading off to change and was stopped by Anita, who I hadn’t seen since
last year. I believe she is racing Cat. 4, but this was only her second ‘cross
event for the year. It was so nice to see her, and we chatted a moment. The ‘cross
community is so friendly; it truly is one of the reasons I ventured into it at
all last year. I remember Anita well from my first race. She was next to me at
the start line, and was so nice and calm although it was only her second ‘cross
race.
I learned after
the race about Tove’s pre-race get-off. It’s amazing she raced, her fingers
already swelling and unable to get a good grip on the handlebars – much less
the brakes. She did, though, and after some TLC over the next couple days the
swelling subsided and mending began.
Time for the Men’s
Cat. 1/2/3 race, and I was requested to help score both that race and
Kirk’s. As always, those guys rode
so fast, and as their race runs a full hour it makes for a LOT of laps. The
race leaders were clocked at six minute laps, and if they slowed down as they
raced it didn’t show. I just take down numbers as they pass, so am unable to
really keep up with lap speeds. The
two duking it out on the front are the same two that usually are: like Kirk and
Jimmy, the Cat. 1/2/3 is usually a match between a young junior and a probably
early-30s-aged racer. Night ‘cross had an announcer who was familiar with many
of the Albuquerque-based riders, and did an excellent job of commentating the
races as they progressed. Down on the field, we couldn’t see anything up on the
rise where the bark section was, but I was happy to hear from the commentary
that pretty much all the Cat. 1/2/3 guys were running the bark, like I had
opted to do. Cool! I’d made a real-time strategy decision that not only worked
for me but was ‘confirmed’ by the more experienced riders.
Then the Masters
50+, Single Speed and Cat. 4 guys lined up. It looked like a pretty big field;
from where we were at the finish I couldn’t see Kirk nor tell the order they
were starting in. I hoped it wasn’t Cat. 4s first – we know that doesn’t work
so well. Thankfully when the first group of racers took off I could tell it was
the Masters 50+ guys because I could see Kirk in the bright yellow SpinDoc
jersey with a huge lead from the ‘hole shot.’ (Generally one rider jumps off
the start faster than anyone else, usually from a point near the center of the
starting line up, but not necessarily; they just manage to hit that extreme
power surge in such a way that they immediately pull out in front, which is
called ‘getting the hole shot.’)
Since I was
helping the USA Cycling officials score and was unsure of protocol, I asked if
it was okay for me to root for my husband. With the okay, I starting hollering
at Kirk who was holding the lead he had over Jimmy. Wow, what a race! Jimmy
would close the gap a little, then Kirk would pull away again. The commentator
was having a ball calling the race, and Kirk got yells and cowbells from all
over the course. As I listened while scoring, I learned that Jimmy was riding
most of the bark while Kirk was running most of it. Riding it didn’t seem to
give Jimmy any advantage, and Kirk by running it didn’t risk losing time by unsuccessfully
riding and ‘getting off’ in it.
It was such an
exciting race! In lap three, somewhere I couldn’t see from the scoring/finish
area, something happened; as Jimmy and Kirk came back into my view, Jimmy was
in the lead. Later, I learned that Kirk had missed that piece of blue tape next
to the tree. It becomes such an optical illusion: the tape looks further back
than it really is, and he hit upon it going so fast that he skidded out and
went down as he tried to suddenly make the right turn around the tree.
They rode so
hard and fast, and had quite a bit of a lead over the rest of their race.
Riders spread out more and more over the course as the race progressed, and
eventually resulted in the leaders passing the last riders. After his get-off,
Kirk had about 3 ½ laps in which to close the gap to Jimmy. On the last lap,
Jimmy and Kirk each changed their strategy, which the announcer took great glee
in discussing: Jimmy opted to run the bark, and Kirk decided he didn’t have
much to lose in trying to ride it.
I don’t know
what the gap was initially – maybe 20 seconds or so – but by the time they
crossed the finish line, Kirk had brought the gap way down to 7 seconds or so.
If there had been just one more lap, he might have regained the lead; who
knows. It was a great, fast, skilled and fun race.
Night ‘cross
will always remain one of my favorites. I’m already looking forward to next
year!
No comments:
Post a Comment