Race Report: CX Nationals
Saturday, December 11th, 2010
I raced at the cyclocross nationals 55-59 masters men race in Bend, Oregon last Thursday, Dec 9th. This division was stacked with talent namely Ned Overend. I lined up in the starting grid behind and one over from Ned thinking I am going to jump on his wheel after the start (as was everyone else near him). The surprising thing I noticed at the start was that Paul Curley (winner of 29 national championships in his racing career and CX national championship last year) had Tufo file threads front and rear on his bike. Seeing that, I am thinking is the man nuts as the course was super muddy and I couldn't imagine anyone running file threads at least not on the front. Curley is a bit of an eccentric riding an all steel bike with bar end shifters and his trademark rear disk wheel...but he wins championships and who can argue with that. However, I believe the file threads on that muddy course had to be a factor in his fourth place finish.
I finished 17th one behind local racer Greg Pautsch by 1.5 seconds. It amazes me that just like last year at CX Nationals I travel all the way to Bend, OR to race against the best in the nation and end up duking it out with my local nemesis again. We were wheel to wheel for the last two laps with Greg edging me out at the finish.
I was mildly disappointed with my performance having less than an A-race. But that is bike racing, some days you are hot and some days you are not. In review, I went out too hard at the start staying with lead group for the first lap and a half and probably cooked myself for the next lap and half. When Greg caught me and I started to recover.
The muddy course, up to 6 inches deep in places, was suited for big power riders with some finesse. I am a big finesse rider with some power, but not big power and the mud bogged me down when I usually grab some mid-race recovery after a heart rate maximizing start. Greg has power and some finesse as when he passed me I could see blood running down his shin and the levers on his bike rotated in and covered in mud. He later told me he went down 5 times compared to me not going down at all. Following him during the last lap looking for a place to pass on the mainly single track course I was thinking about how I got around him last year when he crashed again...that opportunity did not come this year.
Glen Jones
Kari Myrland raced in the 50-54 masters women race two hours before my race and had a great race being her first race on a muddy challenging course. I watched the race from the pit area to help her change a wheel in case of a flat tire and there were many on the high desert part of the course that had sharp angular volcanic rocks protruding at the surface. Kari had a slow start towards the end of the group and moved up at every half-lap as she rode by the pit area. She was heading into 12th place going into the last lap but she didn't come by the pit area and I started thinking something went wrong. I'm looking and looking for her to come by and I see her standing on the outside of course...my suspicion was correct. She yelled, my derailleur tore off from the mud. What a heartbreak as she was heading for the top 10, but now it was DNF because there was no pit bike.
Kari said to her surprise she had fun riding in the mud and enjoyed the challenging course.