Now that I am back from Cyclocross Nationals and have gotten some rest it is time to write about the experience.  Folks have been asking me about the weekend, so I guess it is time to respond.  It is now time for you to hit the delete key if you are not interested  ;)

 

Before we even left for Rhode Island we knew that we would be in for a completely different racing experience than last year.  Some kind of extreme winter weather event had taken Providence a little by surprise and dumped snow, rain, and then more snow on the opening-day’s races.  The course became a slippery mess and the racing was epic.

 

This year’s forecast showed nothing but a few sprinkles in the forecast with 50 degree temperatures.  Great weather for spectating as well as racing!  When we arrived at the venue on Thursday afternoon the sun was shining and nothing more than arm and knee warmers were required to keep warm during our course inspection.  WOW!

 

To my surprise, the course was almost identical in design to last year’s.  The difference this year was that everything was rideable and, despite corners that were a bit slippery, it was going to be pretty fast.  Fun, if you were not racing the race of your entire training year!

 

All the masters raced on Friday, and my race (all women’s categories 40 and over) was the first of the event.  The weather was cloudy and foggy, the ground was a bit damp, but it was still going to be a fast race.  I was on the course at 7:15, and got three practice laps in before I headed over to the staging area.  Knee warmers and elbow covers were the only extra items that I wore.

 

The gun went off and we were underway.  My foot could not seem to find the pedal to click into, so I was a bit off the back until I got that situation under control.  We jumped from the pavement to the grass and the real aggressive racing began.  I moved myself into third, and held that until the first steep climb where I slid back to fifth.  NOT where I wanted to be.  I utilized the road section after a run-up of cement steps to move myself back into fourth and was soon on the wheel of the woman in front of me. 

 

She and I had a fight going on for the rest of that lap.  I tried to figure out how to get ahead of her, as she was doing everything possible to keep me from passing.

I used an enormous amount of power to pass her on the next road section and opened up a substantial gap.  She caught me on the next run-up!  I passed her after remounting at the top, sliding between her and a tree so that I could be the first person down the steep hill which followed.  I got my gap, and put in another huge effort on the road to the finish line.

 

OK, that was only lap one.  I had three more to go!  Lap two was even harder because I was not only playing keep-away, but I was trying to catch second place as well.  And second place was trying to catch first!  The course wrapped around itself enough that you could often see where your competition was, and I was holding my own during that second lap.  I would try to ride as fast and as clean as possible on the technical sections and then would bury myself on the three pieces of road.  It was a good thing that I had my Power Tap wheel on to keep me pushing at my ultimate hardest.  The interval sessions that I had done preceding this race were all coming in handy right now, both for the physical benefit and the emotional.  I just kept telling myself I could suffer more.

 

As the race wore on I pulled away from fourth place fairly steadily.  However, second place was pulling away from me at about the same rate.  I continued to push hard, though, because you never know when someone is going to have a physical or mechanical problem.  Good luck is the combination of opportunity and preparedness, and I wanted to be prepared!

 

The race ended before anyone had mechanicals, though.  I held on to my hard-earned third place, comforted by the fact that I had been beaten by two former Cyclocross National Champions.  The woman who won – Kathy Sarvary – is truly a strong cross racer.  In the Pro woman’s race two day’s later she was 38 out of 72 finishers.  Not bad for woman who’s racing age next year will be 50!  I beat women who have beaten me in the past, too.  In fact, the woman who came in fifth was the silver medalist last year.

 

Other racers that day were not so lucky.  Karl Faruzel, our area’s King of Kross, crashed during his second lap and landed hard on the pavement.  He fractured his hip and was taken to the hospital in Providence, where they operated on him yesterday.  He sounded pretty good on the phone when I talked with him last night, but he will have an uphill battle for a while.  But knowing Karl he will pull off a great recovery and come back in great Kross style next year.

 

Other Central New York Crossers raced as well.  Mark Williams, Tim Leonard, Anna Barensfeld and Mark Shenstone were there and all raced great races against big fields.  And junior Ben Salibra had a great race in his first-ever National Championship.  He had never even seen Cyclocross until September and did his first race in October.  He start number had him seeded way in the back, but he passed a lot of guys to finish in the position he did.  Way to go Ben!

 

One of the benefits of going to Cyclocross Nationals is watching the Pros race.  Saturday afternoon featured the U23 race, followed by the Pro men, and we watched both races before driving home.  The day was sunny and breezy, the combination drying up the course so that it resembled a dry field on a summer day.  These two races were blisteringly fast and amazing to watch.  I got several pointers for my next life – if I come back reincarnated as a Pro Man.

 

So now I am feverishly trying to catch up on my work as I also attempt to finish up Christmas preparations.  What a silly time to have a Nationals!   But that is the way the Christmas cookie crumbles.  Anyway, thank you to everyone who has supported and encouraged me throughout this cycling season, and congratulations to everyone who participated in Cyclocross this season.  Tell your friends next year that it is the greatest sport going and get them started.  It is a GREAT way to pass the fall.

 

Happy Holidays! 

 

Take care,

Margaret