CX Double Header - End of the Season

Work.

That dirty nasty worst of all 4 letter words.  Work is ending my CX Season 1 week early it appears.  I'm being shipped out to Eastern Points across The Pond on Saturday evening and going to miss the BikenetiCX Race 2015 ed.  I am hoping to spend a bit of time setting up Saturday AM but that means I have to be FULLY prepped Friday evening.

Regardless for me, CX season is over.  It was better than last year.  I'm still not fast but I was faster in general.  I learned a bit about myself and what training I need to do to improve next year.

2015 Races
DCCX Day 1
Taccino CX
South Germantown CX
Apple CX Winch-Vegas
Red Shedman CX
Cap Cross CX

They were all fun in different ways.  SG was my best but I pushed WAY hard on that course.  I think I had the most FUN at Apple CX.  DCCX was a blast as I was one of the small group that got to ride the flyover as we raced 1st on Saturday.  Taccino was hard and I wasn't focused at all that day.  Red Shedman was tough, very climby with a good tech section.  Cap Cross may be the best mix overall.

For RSCX I was on the front row with the 01 bib and I KILLED myself on the start sprint.  I had a HUGE gap apparently into the first turn and down a good ways till near the barriers before I was passed.  Then the huge climb back up to the woods killed me.  No issues with the small logs.  Big looping hill wasn't bad but the finish hill absolutely killed me for some reason.  Just no energy in the tank at that point.  3 Very slow and painful laps.  Big smile though and a great venue/event.  Near 60's temp wise by mid-day.  Hanging out with all the regular MD suspects and enjoying beer.

CCCX was an earlier and even colder morning but I arrived in time for a good warm-up lap after registering, then got in another half lap.  Course was faster than the previous year even before considering how wet it was.  The frost was a bit sketchy but no issues.  Legs were not feeling full power and the start method surprised me.  I was in the middle of resetting my gps log!  I got blown by another 30 or so guys in the start from being 22'nd'ish.  Ugh.  First lap was a parade lap really for the first half up till the top of the stair climb, stuff spaced out a bit better there.  The steep run-up was hard!  The chute this year was awesome.  2nd lap was slowly getting better I was switching spots with people and finally started pulling away on the big climb after the chute.  3rd lap my engine finally got going and I started chasing people down, caught up to a teammate at the top of the stairs and started to chase.  Down most of the chute.  CRASH.  Setting up for the stupid root of doom I went down hard on my right shoulder..  Front wheel slipped out.  Sloppy bike handling.  Argh.  UP and off course, done racing.  Another teammate checks me out and nothing is broken, just sore.  Find an official and make DNF official.  Sucks.  After the race I saw I was within 3 or 4 places of moving back into the top 50.  Sigh,  Another great day of hanging out and watching racing.  The Single Speed race will live in infamy for a number of seasons I suspect with Bill S back in and Ian's epic ride on the Pugsley fat bike with pizza, beer, barrier hops, self beering, etc.

Next season I'm looking forward to making a bigger commitment right now to racing more and earlier.  Sept was just busy with work and other stuff, October was a mess with being sick in Mid October.  Then there is MORE.  I think my news will be official tomorrow on that front.  But it's already unofficially official.  I'm going to be...something.

It's been a pretty solid year of biking so far, Oct was a bit of a down and with travel next week I will be a bit more down.  Hoping to make up for it with regular rides while down at the Old Folks Home the week after.

Here's hoping to an even more crazy fun 2016.