evolution cyclocross

finally, the cyclocross season has begun... well the season began weeks ago, but my season began this morning in leesburg at the evolution cyclocross... up at 6:50 and out of the door by 7 to head up to Ida Lee park in leesburg for the 9am C race... arrived just after 8 and drove around the park for a couple of minutes before the i saw the sweet sight of yellow course marking tape... registered and then headed out onto the course for a couple of quick warmup laps...

grass, grass, and more grass... long grass, wet grass, and soon to be muddy grass made up all of the course... the course had 4 steep climbs, 2 of which i figured were rideable (well all of them where if you were on a mountain bike), a couple of slick twisty downhills, one set of barriers and couple of sections of leg-sapping long grass, including the climb up to the finish line...

we lined up half way around the course at the top of a long downhill with a right turn at the bottom... by virtue of being out at the start early i ended up in the middle of the front line and once the whistle blew i was briefly in 2nd place... once we hit the 2nd turn i was back to 5th, and by the third turn i was back to 7th then 9th... over the next lap i traded places back and forth with a couple of riders, losing time on the downhills and dismounts and making it up on the climbs... half way around the 1st full lap i locked up back wheel on a slick downhill and somersaulted down the trail... while i picked myself and my bike up 3 or 4 riders passed me, including a couple that i'd been swapping places with earlier...

over the next lap and a half i pulled back one of the riders and slowly put time on him so that by the last lap he was out of sight... i never saw those other riders again though... i don't know if i would have held them off if i hadn't crashed... overall it was a good race, 12th of 24, my best cyclocross result ever...

richmond tommorow...