Race report : Pychocross #2, cyclocross on half-marathon legs:

This is the continued account of the two-in-one-day-of-racing. I'm going to keep it short. The focus of the day was the half-marathon. The cyclocross race... cool down?

On a very Oregonian afternoon (clouds, damp, rain, mud), I brushed the cobwebs out of my sore running legs and mounted my 'cross bike for it's last race before Cyclocross Nationals. Ideally, this would have been a tune-up race. It would prove to be more of a skills challenge then I bargained for.

For one, my nemesis materialized at the starting line. Later she would explain that she is working to qualify for the Pro Elite Women's race at Nationals... deservedly and totally understandable. But that meant that this race would hurt. Alot.

I had some trouble getting my core temp up, and I had long since lost feeling in my toes and nose before the stat of the race. My start was lackluster, and my quads groaned into action. Within seconds I was on off-cambor rocky terrain that gave way to cakey mud. More quad groaning. Then a minute and a half into the race, I encountered the eight pack... I saw it, and I couldn't decide whether to shoulder or carry the bike. An eight pack. Eight. Barriers. Huh. Going over them as smoothly as possible, I realized that we had to negotiate this obstacle an extra time as the finish line was just up ahead. Yeah, I was right. This was going to hurt.

Hitting the 8-pack at the start.

A quick concrete section and then I encountered a single, high wooden barrier. After jumping back on the bike (looking down) and taking two pedal strokes to clip in, I plowed right into a sand volleyball pit. Cruelly, the course crossed the pit on one side, flipped a bitch and proceeded across the other side. I took the wrong line, the wrong turn radius, and the wrong simultaneously two-footed bike-straddling dead-stop that caused me to dismount for a third time in less than four minutes on the course. Oh, but that's not all.

I rounded about on a mud/dirt road, only five seconds behind my nemesis. We entered rocky single-track, with hidden logs and sticks beneath the leaf-cover. The course dropped into a dry creek bed and looked as if it would continue straight. Instead, I came to a complete stop, almost endo-ing over the handle bars as I realized my nemesis had made a 180 up a left-hand muddy run-up. Dude... I scrambled up the slope in traffic (two other women passed me here). And immediately entered single-track that wound, whipped, and ripped through the back lot of trees and briar bushes.

I passes one woman on the single-track as she negotiated a dropped chain. Then, I was caught by complete surprise by a submerged dip that buried the front wheel. It was only by the strength of my arms that I managed to plow through the giant puddle and up the chain-breaker hill that followed.

More single track, more turns, one more barrier, some stairs, a couple of 180s... and it was time to do the whole course over again. I worked my way up into 2nd, but I kept losing five sconds here and 3 seconds there to my nemesis. It was on the fourth lap that she exited my field of vision and I was left to consider just how badly I wanted to make chase. I wanted to, but I took a vote among various body parts, and both my legs voted "no" and that was the end of that.

I managed to make the barriers look easy, but everything else in the race was a trial. And I mocked myself by dismounting just before the finish, humbly tripping and stumbling over the line carrying my embattled bike.

In all fairness, yes, I did race a half-marathon that morning... but, Nemesis, you still would have wiped the floor with me. Such was your mastery of the treacherous course and your late season fitness. Props.

Cheers! USAC Cyclcross Nationals race report coming soon!