Campus Cross Madness

Goal for the race: Don't get lapped

Finally, the kickoff to the ABA Cyclocross series.

This race appeared out of nowhere as the Midweek Mayhem series opener was moved because of a conflict with the Bow 80 race. I wasn't doing the Bow 80 (which turned out to be a good decision) so I went to this to get a real race in before the Dark Knight race.

The Friday before the race I was at a season wind-up party with the rest of the team and it seemed I was the only one not doing the Bow 80 (which turned out to be a bust as 3/4 of the field DNF'd due to weather...but congrats to those that did finish...you guys are crazy!).

The race took place at the Red Deer College campus and I was glad to get out and race in much nicer weather conditions. I went down with a friend from Bicisport whom I've been practicing and racing with the past few months so that made the drive seem much shorter.

The course was really interesting. It had pretty much everything jammed into one race which made it a lot of fun. There was a sweeping turn on a baseball diamond, 2 runs through a volleyball court, off-camber barrier set, steep run-up, sketchy descent, some single track through the woods, a few hairpin turns and a fast gravel road section. Not much elevation on the course so there were a few power sections.

The amount of running worried me as I still had a huge bruise on my right-shoulder (the shoulder where I put my bike during running sections) so I wasn't sure how I'd be able to cope with the pain. A teammate said to me that my legs will probably hurt so much during the race that I'd forget about my shoulder.

The race started kinda abrutly with no countdown or anything so that was a little odd and that caught me off guard. I ended up in the back pretty quickly and was conserving my energy as you don't know how laps you need to do until 2 laps in. My dismounts were going pretty smoothly and I barely noticed any pain in my shoulder. I was bracing the downtube with my arm to take some pressure off so that might of helped. The off-camber uphill barriers were what really messed me up, I kept catching them with my front tire or barely made it over.

During the first lap and second there was carnage on the steep downhill section. So many crashes as guys were taking it way too fast and not being able to make the sharp left hand turn at the bottom. I gained about 3 positions after the first crash as I somehow manuvered around the fallen riders. Canti's don't stop bikes...they just slow them down!

As the race progressed I was playing cat and mouse with a few guys the entire race. I would catch up on the running sections but they would just hammer the straight-aways. The last few laps the wind was just brutal. I had to go onto my drops and try to just power through even though my legs were killing me. The running through the sand almost became the best part of the course.

Near the end of the race the thing that was really hurting was my back. Super rough single-track on a rigid aluminum bike...not good. My back took a lot of punishment during the race and I couldn't wait to finish it off, if only to stretch out my back a little.

Result: 16/28 (did not get lapped)

Not bad for my first race. I was racing in the Sport category which includes both Cat 4/5 Road categories and Novice/Sport mountain bike categories so I felt that I did fairly well racing against guys who had a few season under their belts. I felt I did everything pretty good and didn't have any crashes or bails. I just need to develop more power through the straights, gauge my energy reserves a little better and get faster at remounting. I also didn't trip on any barriers or on the run-ups like I thought I would. I really enjoyed the course and now anxiously awaiting the Dark Knight 'cross race.

- Kyle