I think we were all a little humbled......but it was an awesome race weekend anyway.
The guys in Savannah are obviously mtb fans as the race had some pretty technical stuff that could have been hucked as well as crossed. They gave us plenty of mud, woops, singletrack as well as the only flyover in the SE.
The cross team for the weekend consited of myself, JP and welcome addition Will Willis borrowed from ASV. We talked a good game on the trip up with all of us hoping of top 10's and me not getting lapped. Will got 20th, JP 24th and myself getting lapped within sight of the finish line. It was a cool race though with lots of mechanicals and crashes.
Next up is the Georgia cross race in Conyers Nov 2. We'll be talking less and fighting harder.
Wow what a weekend. They don't call Gloucester the Superbowl of Cyclocross or the New England Worlds for nothing. The cats in New England know how to put on a race. The course was awesome,the crowds were awesome, the setting was awesome, and the beer tent charged up the fans by mid afternoon to a frothy roar.
First I need to give out a very public thanks to pal Richard Sachs. You'd be hard pressed to name a team that has the palmares as his this last decade winning multiple National Championships and always having a competitive elite program of men and women. To be able to tag along with him and see how he does things on race day will pay dividends as we travel to bigger and better races. And we're all a little better off knowing his wife The Lovely Deb.
My races went pretty well considering everything. Not wanting to race the early race I lined up at 10am both days with about 125-130 B Masters. I don't think we got that many racers in all our categories combined in the FL series so that was a new experience. When The gun went off I was able hold my position for the first 1/2 lap but would begin to fade to my own pace once we started hitting the hills and barriers. One thing I noticed is nobody pulls away from me on the technical turns and downhils. Years of riding an MTB always kept me close to the other racers in those parts of the course only to get motored on the flat sections. Saturday I was scored in 25th place, keeping intact my streak of questionable scoring. Since my placing was so muffed at Webster-Roubaix I decided it was Karma and would gladly take the result.
Sunday I rode a better race and placed 95th out of 129 starters. Was the scoring right, who knows? I do know I rode a better race. I was able to stay on the gas the whole race compared to Saturday which saw me fade the last lap big time. Sunday's course was harder too with a very steep run up. One thing to mention is tire pressure. I dropped my tire pressure 2 psi Sunday to 30 front and 32 rear based on advice I had gotten from Sachs the night before. I told him that on Sunday I wanted to really kill the corners and the only thing he said was drop your pressure. It worked, thanks.
Gosh darn it would be hard to improve on the weekend. If possible I'll be going back next year. Gloucester is an event not to be missed.
Next week is Savannah Cross which will be the return of young pals Will Willis and Michele Blake to our cross team. I am certain I'll have a podium shot of one or both of them and JP Russo will get another top 10 in Men's B's and will be podium material too if he does the Junior category. Till next week.....
The abridged team(JP, Brent and I)road tripped up to Dahlonega GA for the first race of the Colavita FL cross season. The sights in Rural GA always are good for a few laughs.
These guys in GA know how to build a course. Besides the perfect park setting the course featured fast grass, gravel and pavement. Add in 2 sets of barriers, a log obstacle with sand run up,flower garden, and a nice set of stairs and you've got an awesome course. I got 17th on the day which was not DFL and JP pulled off a 10th iirc. He looked strong and battled all the way through 45 minutes probably passing 15 -20 riders.
We finished the race on a high in Atlanta eating non official Colavita road trip food (forgive me coach).
I'd have better shots but the Colavita Nikon started going haywire and this is all we gots for now.
