Pycho Cross #3

Half the reason I dont race cross on a regular basis is the mud. I hate mud. It gets all over everything, messes up the bike. Destroys parts. Gets everywhere and takes hours of time post-racing of dealing with.

But on dry days I will attempt cross. Note: I do not have a cross bike (I feel if I did have one, I'd have to take cross a lot more seriously - which I cant quite stomach), and have only ever practiced dismounting and remounting once. I can now dismount my bike pretty ok like, but I stutter when I try to hop on the bike. Not to mention I dont like banging my lady parts on the saddle (I know thats now how its supposed to work, but re-read the above, I've spent a whole 40 minutes outside of races doing that).

So yesterday was Psycho Cross #3, put on the by the lovely Sal, who may actually be thinner than I am (he is, however, significantly taller). Sal loves to torture us. Women's races are 45 mins. The course was so long that we only did 3 laps. The leaders could have done 4, but that would have been 50-55mins for the race, and the last girls would have been out there for an hour+. So 3 laps it was. Which was fine, because I wasnt too excited to do 4. There was pretty much everything. Barriers, sustained running (gross), run up, baby head rocks, single track, peanut butter mud, fields, winter crops, puddles, sand and descent. It took us about 12-13 minutes per lap. Yes thats long. I mean it took the men A 9-9:30 per lap. So its not like I was walking or anything.

So I get the hole shot (haha, that one of my favorite phrases). But give it up quickly as I didnt want to be the first one through the peanut butter mud. Oh well. The one A girl and the B sandbaggers were much faster than I was. Not to mention they have cross bikes and dismount/remount skills.

I caught one, she dropped her chain, and was trying very hard to get it back on. So I drilled it. Got a gap on her, but she made her way back up to me. I held her off for just over a lap (thanks to the fatty tires and my low weight in the mud) until we got to the last barrier, where I didnt get the front wheel up quite high enough, tagged the barrier, and then tripped over it. In the process of doing all that I managed to drive the end of my handle bars directly into my ear. Note: I dont recommend this. She killed and got a gap on me.

I rode a clean last lap and came in 4th in the Bs. And 5th overall (out of 15ish). So thats not too bad. I have dirt riding abilities, but obviously no barrier skills. The one thing that made me most proud was the fact that nobody passed me on the running section. Oh and the fact that I could ride the run-up.

I rarely use that part of my head.