Sunday marked the last event of Portland's insanely popular 'Cross Crusade Series. The racing season isn't over yet, but the end is near. Finally, I'm improving. I wasn't sick today, and apparently that helps one's racing performance. Shocking, I know.
This race brought yet another flavor cyclocross venue to appease our mud-thirsty pallets. A large chunk of the course was quite bumpy, which is never a crowd pleaser. The flat ground yielded increased race speed, making an otherwise tame course a bit more challenging with a lot of slippery turns. There was a strange pile of wood chips that smelled a lot like horse poo, and a rodeo arena, which is now pretty much a huge mud bog due to all the rain we had this past week. We're talking mud at least 8 inches deep, with the consistency transitioning back and forth between vegetable oil and extra chunky peanut butter.
I'm still smiling from this race. I had a great day on the bike, as I felt very much in control and could ride around just about everything without using the brakes. I'm riding a Bailey O'Brien, and I absolutely love the tight handling I'm getting with it. I could pass on the inside, I could pedal around paved 180s, it was a blast.
I was just about last row in the start today. We took off down a gravel road, and barreled into a bumpy grass field. After some initial bottlenecks, things spread out fairly well. Aside from Bill Gorski, anyone who I passed today did not pass me back. That was cool, because I passed a lot of people.
A few times, I worked my way up to a group, thinking I was probably going to get dropped. But in the end, I left them behind. It was a great feeling to finally have some oomph to race aggressively.
On the last lap, I somehow got away from a group of four and bridged up to Bill. I got a good gap on him in some tight turns, but he came around me in that mud bog and got me at the line. I don't know how I placed in the race because the results are pretty messed up right now (mud covers our numbers, making it really hard to keep track of us). If the results are ever worked out, it'd be nice to know how far behind the leaders I was, but whatever. It was fun to be able to race the race instead of try and survive it.
My cyclocross season will end with a bang with the final two races of the USGP series at Portland International Raceway on December 6th and 7th. This event is a big deal, attracting racers from all over North America. If you've never seen a cyclocross race, this would be a good one to check out. It's a good opportunity to witness this silly mud-loving culture that's running rampant in this town.
Until the USGP, I'm hoping to stay healthy and continue doing some high intensity riding to keep the speed up. Normally around this time of year, I'm quite ready for the cyclocross season to be finished. But since I've had such a bad go this time around, I'm as motivated as ever to keep pushing. I won't be winning anything, but just having a respectable ride with an even faster field than normal would be spectacular.
Photo: SoSoVelo
