check out my blog write-up on the Epic Cx Race from this past weekend. site is here.
taylor
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Sunday, January 17, 2010
Monday, January 11, 2010
Racing On the White Stuff
Sunday turned out to be a great day of racing. I think everybody struggles to motivate themselves when its late in the season,you've got sub-freezing temps outside and add to that...10 plus inches of snow on the ground that has accumulated over the last 10 days. Several folks should be thanked for all their hard work they put in the week leading up to Sunday's race in Shawnee, KS. The race course for this years Grote Prijs was again held at Hermann Laird Park and the 'Old Shawnee Town' grounds. To Mark and Teresa of LocalCycling and Mike Berning, the City of Shawnee and a few of the Slimen Crew for putting in a ton of man hours to get the course into such great race condition despite of the frigid temps this past week, Thanks A Lot!
Sunday's course was shortened due to all of the snow and lack of heavy machinery to really allow for you typical 1.5 to 2 mile cx course. Despite that, the course was groomed absolutely perfect. It was super fun at race pace, fast in some areas and challenging and leg burning in others. For those of us that rely on technical skills versus sheer horsepower, it was perfect. It actually gave myself and a few others(i.e. houston) a chance to beat some guys that normally beat us on the more wide open courses. So again, thanks Mark and thanks 'Weather Gods' for shining down upon me and Joe:)
15 degree weather means warm-up and race prep is a challenge. However, this was the third race in a row dealing with the frigid temps and 2nd race in a row dealing with lots of snow. So I kind of had the tire choice and psi thing dialed going into sunday's race. I just needed to make sure i got a decent warm-up. That is still a tall order. But i managed to get to the race parking lot pre-dressed and i just needed to get a new race number pinned on. Once i had that done, I spent the next 45 minutes warming up on the course. I rode both the A and B bikes and made some last minute psi checks on the tires and i was ready to go.......
So call-up and the start of the race was at the bottom of a 200 meter climb to the right hand turn onto the the grass/snow. All the late season heavy hitting regulars were lined up, so I knew it was gonna be the typical fast start with me looking to latch on to Lucas, Songer or Stidnicki's wheel for as long as possible. Since we had ample room at the start, the officials felt it appropriate to line up like 12 across at the start. All this does is allow for a screwy scetchy start by allowing some guys to mix it up at the wistle who have never seen the front before. So you got to be quick gettin clipped in and fast up to speed to leave those guys behind before they can cause any undo chaos.
So with the pre-race instructions and roll call out of the way, the official blows her whistle and we are off. I am lined up on the far right hand side, i am quickly clipped in and up to speed with no problem. This allows me to not have to immediately 'red-line' to get a good position going into the bottleneck at the entry into the grass/snow. In fact, i find myself, without to much more effort getting the 'hole-shot' into the snow. From here, I bomb down a icy off camber little downhill which leads the racers thru a somewhat rutted out but fast flat into a lose snow uphill left hander. This little hill isnt the problem. Its the fact that the racer has to decide on one of two lines. The hugh line or the low line, and in warm-up the line to take was the low line. I actually take the low line as planned and once I get near the top I wash out in a rut and clip out and lose all momentum. I panic a little getting clipped back in and figure 3 or 4 racers are going to come flying by me at this point. However I am qhickly back up to speed and i rail the next 3 or 4 turns that are mostly fast snow banked turns that I can take at pretty good speed. These next few turns actually allow the racer to see what going on behind him because the course kind of turns back on itself. I am able to see behind me 2 or 3 tuens and the only guy I see is my teammate Joe Houston. Holy Shit!.....everybody watching the race and all the guys behind me a joe have to be thinking the world is upside down right now. But in reality, the course and the conditions were ideal for Joe and I to be where we were. I just didnt see the start of the race playing out quite that perfectly for us. Mark Studnicki missed a pedal at the start, Steve Songer and Andy Lucas, both 360 racers got poor starts as well. This allowed me to get to the front and which in turn motivated Joe to dig deep to stay on my wheel(he hates losing to me more than anybody else:)...so Joe and I were off and had nothing but clear race track ahead of us. Nothing to worry about but racing our own race and taking the lines we wanted to take for the next few laps. I was continually looking back over the next lap or 2 and joe was always right there at about 10 seconds back. He and i were riding really smoothly. I think Joe made a couple of slight bobbles that allowed Mark and Andy to finally track him down. I think both of those guys expected to leave Joe in the dust immediately, but Joe had other plans. He really made the 360 duo of Andy and Steve work really hard. At 3 laps to go and 5 laps into the race, Mark finally tracked me down. 2 laps into the race, the leaders of the 40+ 'A' race were already struggling getting around lapped riders. with only 1 or 2 lines in most of the course, it was tough to pass in a lot of places. I had to get off and run my bike on a little steep climb that was rideable normally, from laps 3 thru 5 due to a slower lapped rider. As clean as my race was the 1st half, the 2nd half of my race was filled with little bobbles and mistakes. This wasnt any different than Mark and Andy, who tracked me and Mark down with 2 laps to go. From there, Mark and I tooks turns bouncing off of each other and even Andy hit the dirt/snow once when all 3 of us were together for the last 2 laps. So Andy, Mark and myself took turns riding away from the others only to wipe-out and see the other 2 ride past us. Mark actually bit it on a straight away going thru the 1800's farm town in a soft snow rut. Andy and I thought that that was the end of Mark, but he came roaring back. We were actually all 3 together at the sound of the bells signifying '1 lap to go'. I was the one who made the last big mistake or the first mistake on the bell lap midway thru. I washed out in some soft snow trying to get around lapped traffic all while trying to stay glued to Mark's wheel. That was it for me. I couldnt close down that mistake and that gap. It was only about 5 seconds but that was plenty going thru the last half of that course. Mark took the win with Andy right behind in 2nd and i came in about 6 seconds later for 3rd. It truned out to be a super fun race. I hindsite, I would have liked to take a different line or 2 those last couple of laps, but i had a rally good race. I beat some super strong guys in Slimen teammate Jeff Unruh and 360 Steve Songer. Teammate Joe had a great race, giving Steve all he could handle and finished 5th.
All in all, not a better way to spend a Sunday morning or early afternoon in 15 degree temps and lots of snow. Unless of course you live in the mountains, and then I would be snowboarding. It's Kansas, and we love our cx here........huh? they aren't hardy enough to race cx in January in the 'cross meccas' of Portland and the New England areas. Whats' up with that??
See you at next week Cx race up in the Northland........
jt
SlimenUndGrossen Racing
Slimen racing blog under new construction........come back and see us soon
thanks,
jt
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