Well, it is officially Cross season now! This past weekend was the 1st event of the MFG Cyclocross series out here in Washington, and despite the rain the past week, the event was dry and hot like usual. This year I am racing in the 1/2 field, so not only are the races longer, but also against a harder field.
As mentioned in my previous post, I am primarily racing a new bike this year - a Baron Nightingale CX. This event helped show me how good this machine will be for racing this year, however the race also showed me I have a lot of work to do this year!
I had a terrible start (mostly my fault for doing a practice lap) and ended up in the last row. We started with a rush and I managed to climb up a few spots as we moved into the field and started through the corners on the field. I jumped through the corners and made up spots as much as possible.
As we hit the bottleneck single-track section, I dismounted and managed to squeeze past a few more riders who were stuck dealing with the traffic.
Rushing through the course, I definitely started to feel the results of the heat and the work. As we made it to the lap count-down (about 30 minutes into the race), I was definitely slowing down. Luckily, most of the other riders were starting to run out of steam too. I was slowly making up ground as possible, but was very thankful for the final lap.
Putting everything I had left into the pedals, I raced through the last lap and managed to squeeze past one more rider before hitting the finish line.
Still ended up being further back than I wanted, finishing 31st of the 40 starters.
Time to re-focus, build up, and hit Starcrossed next weekend with full force!
