Secondary goal: Finish in the top half
“So you had some much on Saturday night at the Dark Knight ‘Cross you just can’t wait to race again.”
The technical guide makes it seem like such a great idea. Same race again...in less than 24 hours...why not?
Well just as the guide said it was the same course...but totally different conditions. Even though the course should have been engrained in our minds after having raced it yesterday...the conditions “modified” it to be almost a totally different race.
A race start decision had been made to cut off much of the off-camber steep sections as many people were forced to walk/drag their bikes through much of it because of the mud. It was going to be a few hundred meters shorter...but I’m sure the laps took almost the same amount of time to run as they were slower than the day before.
The race started and right away after the barriers I could see how the race was going to go. I decided to shoulder my bike and run up the hill as it was extremely muddy on the descent and I wasn’t sure if I’d have any traction. On the off-camber top section I made a decision that pretty much cost me the race. I decided to dismount and run the whole top section as I saw guy sliding out and thought it’d be faster. I was getting passed on my run and I kept slipping anyways so that idea turned out to be a bust.
The next few laps I was still shouldering on the run up and trying not to slip and fall while carrying my bike on the descent but I decided to ride the top off-camber section to make up some time. It was about this time that it started to become more and more difficult to clip into my pedals because my cleats and my pedals were clogged with mud and grass. By the last lap I was losing time (and places) from having to slow down to bang my shoes on my pedals just to be able to clip in to pedals up the climbs. The last lap I had to run a climb because I couldn’t get my pedals unclogged and ride the off-camber section with my shoes sliding all over the pedals.
My last lap was pretty much déjà-vu from the night before. There were two of us side-by-side going to the running sand section. I was running as hard as I could when I heard a sound to my right. One of the riders decided to ride the sand section. He was going super hard and was beating me through the section. I secretly hoped he would tire out and be forced to dismount but he kept going. There was no way I could catch up because he didn’t have to remount. After the race I went up to the rider and told him that was awesome that he rode that...he said he only rode it that one time because he figured he had enough energy to do it only once.
Result: 23/30 (did not get lapped)
Not close to what I wanted but I know what I did wrong in that race right from the get go. Really this race came down to 2 things...tire pressure and tire choice. Had I run the right pressure I probably would have been able to ride the steep section and probably would have been able to descend. I would have also been able to go a lot faster on the off-camber section because I wouldn’t be trying to control the sliding. I’m still building up my collection of ‘cross tires but I’m sure a set of mud tires might have made a difference.
Oh well...it still felt like a real cross race...fun and muddy.
- Kyle
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