I started this blog post on the way back from Bend in December 2009. Since I'm leaving in a couple days for the 2010 edition of Cyclocross Nationals, I thought it's probably time to finish it off. So without further ado: Dave and Dino's 2009 Cyclocross Nationals adventures...
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| 2009 Cyclocross National Championships. |
Nats. No cute title here. This is the pinnacle of US ‘cross – even for us pack fodderlings. This was the event that we had prepped for all year. Weekend after weekend of racing. Denying ourselves that extra chocolate chip cookie after dinner. Stocking up on thermal bike clothes. Intervals on the trainer in the garage at 10 pm. This was the endgame to all the sacrifice.
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| Destination: Bend, OR. But first, LA traffic. |
Dino and I started the long, 15 hour trip from sunny SoCal up to frozen (literally) Bend, OR on Tuesday evening along with O and S. After an overnight stop in Fresno to drop the kids off at the grandparents, we continued north. Here's a summary of the drive:
- San Diego to Orange County: beautiful views of the Pacific Ocean
- OC to Santa Clarita: traffic and more traffic
- Santa Clarita to Lebec: snow on the Grapevine
- Lebec to Fresno to Sacramento: Central Valley agriculture aromas galore
- Sacramento to Redding: Mellow traffic and moderately scenic
- Redding to Bend (overnighting in Klamath Falls): Stunning mountain views
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| Frost on the Subaru in Klamath Falls. |
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| Holy crap! What are we in for? |
It was on the last leg, between Klamath Falls and Bend, that we watched the car thermometer edge lower and lower. When it bottomed out at -5° F, Dino mentioned that turning around and heading back to where water exists in a liquid form would be preferable to freezing her tukus off in the frozen north. Luckily she was kidding... mostly... there was an unfortunate incident involving a metal toilet seat in an unheated gas station bathroom, but I won't go into details here. I think the fact that we saw several bald eagles just north of Klamath Falls helped convince her we were doing the right thing.
We made it to Bend on Thursday, just in time for the noon course pre-ride session. We dressed down, meaning we layered on every piece of bike clothing that we owned, and hopped out on the course. At a balmy 24° F, the course was a 2.5 km long slip-and-slide.There were probably 400 people all trying to ride the course at the same time at all skill levels from abject beginner to seasoned Euro-pro. I believe the military term for this sort of happening is Charlie Fox. You pretty much couldn't ride any faster than walking pace in many of the sections. Nevertheless, it did provide a preview of the course. My first impressions were threefold: short, narrow, and slippery. Overall, I loved the venue and liked the course. It unfortunately wasn't really suited for 100+ fields with lots of constriction points that were made worse by the ice and were sure to cause havoc during the first lap of all the big races. Not surprisingly, my prediction on this proved to be true in race after race [video links demonstrating this fact are below]. Allow me to pause and editorialize for a moment: US cyclocross is at a crossroads (no pun intended) where the national championships are still trying to retain a grass roots-all inclusive-participatory nature but are getting swamped by huge numbers of riders. USAC and nationals promoters are going to have to decide to either limit the number of entries to some of the larger fields or modify the course (within reason) to accommodate the fields. Their goal should be to create a positive racing experience for all of the participating racers while maintaining an event that is selective enough to produce a worthy national champion. [Note, it looks like a longer course with several long straights and a time trial based seeding system will help accomplish this in 2010... we'll see if it works.] Okay, I'm stepping off the soapbox - back to the story... As I said, I liked the course. Furthermore, it would have been an absolute blast if it wasn't so icy. It had great flow, lots of interesting features: off-camber, drop-ins into U-turns, a giant staircase, and a well placed barrier set. With the ice (no fault of the organizers) it became super-technical. When you're focusing that hard on not crashing, the racing is still fun but definitely less than it could be.
After the pre-ride, we dressed in multiple layers of our warmest clothes and hung out at the venue waiting for the check-in time at the condo. Happily, this allowed us to cheer on Celo hard man, former national CX champion, and all around nice guy, Lee Willmore, during the old coots Masters 65-69 race.
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| Lee Willmore clearing the nasty off-camber uphill during the 65-69 race. |
In addition to watching the fast old guys race, we also got to see lots of SoCal friends line up for the Masters 40+ B race. Al Morinaka (Velocity), Paul Avila (Bicycle John's), Geoff Albert (SoCalCross), and Jeff Goble (Sho-Air) were all racing in the extremely slippery conditions. While snapping photos and cheering everybody on, we noticed that Jeff Goble had gone missing. We figured it was some sort of mechanical but found out later that he had slipped out on some black ice and double fractured (tibula and fibula) his leg. You can see where he crashed on the
course preview video @1:19. Jeff crashed in the same spot as the rider shooting the video.
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| Al Morinaka enjoying the sunshine. |
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| Paul Avila grits his teeth on one of the few long straightaways. |
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| Jeff Goble moments before his race-ending crash. |
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| Geoff Albert uses body English to stay upright on the ice. |
After the races we headed over to the condo to settle in. Fellow Celo's Brent and Gail as well as Carrie and Josh (Carrie is a former teammate from my time in WA) were all sharing a townhouse not too far from the venue. After cleaning up our bikes, Brent, Gail, Dino, and I all headed to Jackson's Corner, a restaurant that was recommended by several different sources. Little did we know that they were hosting a CX event that evening with a few big name riders, including Molly Cameron, giving presentations. The place was packed and the line was long...but the food was well worth the wait.
Friday, Dec. 11: Today was Dino's turn to race and my turn to do race support. Dino's race wasn't until 1:00 pm so we didn't head over to the venue until just before 11:00 am. Once I got Dino suited up and settled onto the trainer, I wandered around to cheer for friends in the singlespeed race and. One interesting thing I noted was that the course had been changed a bit from the previous day. A new icy, twisty-turny section - with a couple of off-camber spots - was added just after the barriers. It lengthened the course a tiny bit and added yet another modicum of technicality. The singlespeed field was massive for being a non-championship event. Unfortunately for Brent, the staging was done randomly by bib number. This put Brent well towards the back of the starting grid. Annette lucked out and got a front row start...it also turned out that she was the only woman in the singlespeed race which garnered her quite a bit of attention. Once the race started, it quickly became apparent how slick the course was. This
video was shot on a little off camber riser during the first lap. Not surprisingly, given the conditions, there was significant carnage.
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| Brent Prenzlow battled from a poor starting position to a 14th place finish. |
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| Annette Padilla: Susan B. Anthony for the singlespeed CX community. |
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| Lee Willmore showing how it's done. |
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| Paul Avila makes it over the off-camber hill with only a slight dab. |
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Geoff Albert crashes on the off-camber hill (not for the first time)
with Paul Hernandez right behind. |
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After the singlespeed race, the course was open for recon and warm up. Similar to yesterday, it was mobbed but Dino managed to get in a bit of practice until, while dropping into the "Bob's Red Mill Oatmeal Bowl" she slid out on a rut and jammed her chain behind her crank. I found her walking back with bike on shoulder looking dejected. "I couldn't get the chain back on." We rushed to the pits but the neutral support guys were all out to lunch (literally, I think) so I put the Salsa up on a stand and manged to yank the chain out without taking off the chain rings. I got it fixed just in time as the Masters Women were starting to stage. We headed over to the start area. Dino was very nervous. The 40-44, 45-49, 50-54, 55-59, and 60+ women were all racing at the same time - though starting in waves 30 seconds apart. After collecting Dino's warmup clothes, and the whistle blew starting her wave, I started walking around cheering on SoCal riders and taking photos. Dino rode a very respectable race finishing 39th, just over a lap down on the leader (she finished right behind the 2nd placed rider).
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| How did you talk me into this? |
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| Dot Wong against a brilliant Oregon sky. |
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| Carol Ruckle on her way to 4th place in the 55-59 field. |
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| This race had everything...even fiddle players. |
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| New England-to-SoCal transplant Robin MacDonald-Foley enjoying the frigid weather. |
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| Dino negotiating one of the more slippery turns. |
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| Annette focused on the race, oblivious to the Sasquatch walking by. |
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| Dino sprinting it out! |
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| Women of SoCal. |
With Dino's race over, we started cleaning up to head back to the condo. Before we left, however, we took a few minutes to cheer on friends Allison Beall and Megan Cordes in the Women's 30-34/35-39 race.
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| I can't believe Allison is old enough to race Masters! |
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| Queen Chiweenie, Megan C., climbs out of a drop-in/U-turn combo. |
After getting home, getting Dino defrosted, and the Salsa cleaned up, we relaxed a bit then headed out to dinner. We met friends from the Palouse, Allison Beall and Ted Chauvin, at
Deschutes Brewery. Being a brewpub at a cyclocross race (not to mention one of the sponsors of the race) there was a very long wait - but once again it was worth it. The sweet and spicy mac and cheese that I had for dinner was excellent and it was nice to catch up with Allison and Ted. My only regret was that because I was racing the next day, I limited myself to only one beer. No such restrictions tomorrow night.
Saturday, Dec. 12: Up at 6:00 a.m. to get some food on board for my 9:30 a.m. race. A bowl of oatmeal and piece of toast with PB&J. Then it was time to embrocate and suit up. A short sleeve skinsuit, followed by a layer of Sportsbalm Hot on the legs, then wool socks, thermal leg warmers, a polypro long sleeve base layer, a short sleeve Craft windfront base layer, and arm warmers. This was topped of with a polypro skull cap and Glacier neoprene gloves, when on the bike. I added a few more layers for the drive over to the venue. Once there, I hopped on the bike to take advantage of the last chance to pre-ride before our race. I started off mid-lap with the grassy section below the Deschutes Brewery. The grass seemed pretty grippy so I decided to try and take the stairs hot. It was a bad idea that resolved something like this: (1) unclip right side, (2) swing right leg over and through, (3) plant foot, and (4) slide out, narrowly avoiding a head first crash into the stairs. At least I was providing entertainment for fellow San Diegans Scott Rittschof and Dan Breyer (Focus USA) who were positioned at the top of the stairs. After collecting what was left of my dignity, I continued along the course through the section that they had added the day before - it was tricky but not too bad. The exit of the section had a barely ridable off camber piece that they ended up straightening out before the racing started (which was a good thing). The big surprise was that they changed the section after the run/ride hill (I couldn't quite ride it because it was too slippery for my skills). Instead of a straight shot back down to the pavement, the course now continued across the top before dropping into a steep, icy ,rutted, side-slope descent that terminated in a hairpin turn. Yup...death cookies. This section scared the crap out of me. If you crashed on your left side, you'd just slide down the hill on your butt. However, if you were unfortunate enough to crash on your right side, it was a loooong way down onto some very hard ice. I continued around the course and discovered that everything on the snowy (east) side of the course was nicely frozen and had reasonable traction. However, the west side (including the stairs and the death cookies descent) was just starting to thaw, resulting in a water over ice condition – in other words, it was slipperier than cat snot. I decided to do multiple practice runs on the ride/run hill (which I never managed to clear) and the descent. I built up some confidence that I could make it down without crashing but it was still definitely psyching me out. Prior to today, I can't remember the last time I was actually scared before a race. But the convergence of Jeff's broken leg, a vast mob of testosterone laden competitors, and the new death cookies section...well, let's just say that my sphincter was puckered tighter than Kirstie Alley's corset after a three day binge at Marie Callender's.
It took awhile to stage all 155 of us but finally we were all lined up, instructions were given, and the course was cleared. Bang! I was far enough back that it took a few seconds to start moving. I was just coming up to full speed when I had to lock up my brakes. I skidded to a stop, narrowly avoiding leaving Tufo Flexus tread prints all over Geoff Albert's butt. A
wicked crash (you can see the reverse angle
here) took down several riders including Geoff. Although I managed to stay upright, I was pinned in as more riders crashed into the back of me, tangling pedals and wheels. This pretty much ended my already slim chance of meeting my one goal for the race of finishing on the lead lap. By the time I got to the end of the paved starting straight, I was already
26 seconds down. The first small hill on the ice was chaos and I was at the back. With very little in the way of passing space due to the icy nature of the course, I ended up riding most of the first lap at walking pace - I was never even breathing hard. By the time we hit the stairs (~3/4 of a lap into the race) I was over
2 minutes down on the leaders. More video from the first lap is
here (you can see me at the very end).
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| Waiting for staging: "Are we there yet?" |
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| The Sasquatch is handing out money but BP's not interested. |
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| Obligatory barrier photo: Brent Prenzlow. |
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| Obligatory barrier photo: Jeff Herring. |
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| Obligatory barrier photo: Geoff Albert. |
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| Obligatory barrier photo: Dave. |
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| Dave trying not to think about the frites vendor across the road. |
Once we were done with the first lap, the riders were spread out enough that I could pour on the gas and start to race. For the next couple of laps, I went as hard as I could with lots of close calls that usually resulted in clipping a foot out and a huge adrenaline bolus. No crashes though... well, at least not by me. It seems like I was passing somebody on the ground every 15 seconds or so. After 3.5 laps I was headed past the pits, and finally starting to feel comfortable when I was whistled off the course by USAC official, Phil Miller. I was being pulled since the leaders were close to lapping me. I couldn't believe it and was seething as I walked through the pits on my way to find Dino and my warm-up clothes. Luckily I'm not the demonstrative type or the anger that was bubbling to the surface would have turned into a tantrum capable of making my pre-school daughters proud. I was angry at myself, the guy who caused the crash at the start, the promotors for making such a short lap length, USA Cycling for letting the promoters make such a short lap, the snow for being so slippery, and... well... as you can see, I wasn't being very rational. For the record, I ended up 121st out of 155 starters (and another ~45 DNS's). The leaders ended up doing a total of 6 laps with the winner, Peter Webber, finishing in 40:36.
After I'd calmed down a bit, the post-event deflation began: I've focused all year on this 45 minutes of racing... now what? The short term answer was simple: get cleaned up and enjoy the rest of the trip. So back to the condo to clean body and bike then we made a quick trip out to the hospital to visit Jeff Goble. Jeff was doing well considering the 20+ screws and pins and the 4 mm rod inserted into his leg. We got to hear the entire story of his crash and aftermath. It's an amazing story that I won't relate here - it's his story to tell after all... make sure to ask him about it the next time you see him at a race. From the hospital, we headed back to the venue to watch the Master Men 35-39 race. The course had largely changed from snow/ice to mud. It looked like a heck of a lot more fun than our race. I didn't really care, however, as I was very focused on eating frites and cheering on Ted and the Bailey Bikes boys, John Bailey and John Behrens. The evening was spent with a the Celo crew at McMenamins where dinner went well with their seasonal nut brown ale.
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| Jeff's leg prior to the addition of a bunch of metal screws and rods. |
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| Early in the race: Bailey's leg warmers are still white. |
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| Ted Chauvin working hard. |
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| Mmmmm...frites. Nom, nom, nom. |
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| John Bailey dripping mud. |
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| John Behrens survives another trip down the nasty descent. |
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| Sorry, Rover, you'll have to wait outside. |
Sunday: That was it. Unfortunately we didn't have time to stay and watch the elite races. So it was time to gas up the car (remember - this is Oregon - you can't pump the gas yourself), get some coffee, and drive home. For whatever reason, the trip south seemed to go by much faster that when we were headed north. We drove straight through to Fresno where we spent the night and then headed back to San Diego the next day.
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| Heading south from Bend: a long, straight road under a brilliant blue winter sky. |
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| Back to California...was it all just a dream? |
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| Looking north from Hwy 97 near Mt. Shasta (click to see the full size photo). |
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| Back in SoCal. |
A few more things: Full
results can be found on the USA Cycling website. All of the above photos and many others can be viewed in our
Flickr photostream. And a few more photos from CyclingNews can be found
here,
here, and
here.
Let's hope that CX Nats 2010 is as much fun as 2009. Regardless, I promise it won't take quite so long to get up my race report this time.
