Indian Lakes Cyclocross Race Report

Since South Chicago Wheelmen decided to deviate from the ChiCrossCup formula and host the Indian Lakes race on a Saturday, I was able to sleep in and generally have a lazy Saturday morning - something that hasn't happened in several years. It was great! Pancakes, Awful TV, Newspaper, Coffee. Yes.

It was already 62F outside when I packed up the car to head out to Bloomingdale, and once there it was indeed a perfect day. I forgot the camera so no pictures, sorry. After pre-riding the course a couple of times and watching the 3's, Juniors/Women, and 1/2/3's race, I'd decided that heckling was far too much fun to miss the hecklespectacle of the 4b's race and went to registration to up my category to 4a.

Right off the bat, I was in a bad spot - 4th row before callups. Ugh. As we scooted forward from the holding pen to the start line, I was able to gain a row, but that wasn't of much comfort. This course didn't have much of a hole shot unfortunately, the first 100m or so were just a straight on sprint into a quick and technical 90 degree right, 180, 90 degree right section, followed by another fast 100m before a barrier and the run-up. With the tape staying wide throughout all of this, the first few minutes of the race were a battle to keep your wheels away from others while staying upright and making sure you weren't behind a bad wheel.

I ran the hill the first time because there just wasn't enough space to remount the bike... probably should have run it every lap. After descending and a quick loop around to the back side, there was another barrier and another trip up the hill, albeit the steeper side. The race was a little more strung out at this point so I found my rhythm and settled in. The first sand pit was rideable on the first lap, but I couldn't ride the last meter or so on subsequent laps - I ran the second sand pit every time. On the third(I think) lap, I got to my fateful last meter of the first sand pit, stalled, and attempted to dismount. In my haste, I felt my shoe make contact with something hard - helmet, perhaps? I looked back and saw there had been a guy on my wheel, and I'd just kicked him in the head. After a winded, brief exchange and apology we were off once again.

Pacing is difficult for me in Cyclocross because it requires a pretty immense effort for me to just make the bike move, but I was able to make some progress in this race. With 2 laps to go, I backed off just enough to only let 2 people pass me - this let me get some recovery time in for the last lap, where I drilled it as hard as I could. Coming in on the back stretch, there was a fairly long grass/pavement section where I dialed it up to about 30mph and passed 5 or 6 riders. I wasn't entirely sure that my brakes would slow me down in time for the 180 around the tree that followed, but I was able to bleed enough speed to negotiate that turn without problem.

In picking those guys up, I finished 48th out of about 70 starters. Not in the points or cash, but respectable enough for me.

In all - a great race hosted by the South Chicago Wheelmen. I'm hoping the ChiCrossCup can return here next year, especially since the amenities at this race were the best out of the entire series (Hot Tubs and a Heated Locker Room!).

Oh yeah, and I didn't break a thing, despite numerous heckles encouraging me to "destroy that bike!"

Rear Derailleur Carnage

Fitting that this bit of horrific news comes right around Halloween. After successfully completing the St Charles 4b's race today, I was riding back over to the area where most of the other xXx'ers were... when I hear a pop, feel the tension on the cranks drop away, and my rear wheel jams. I look down.. to see this.

I think to myself, shit! Another drivetrain failure at this race! Last year, I tore the bead on a tire and had to run half a lap, then finally popped a chain for a DNF. I initially thought that one of the pulleys in the derailleur had failed, bending the derailleur hangar and destroying the chain and derailleur... but upon further inspection:

waaait a minute. the hangar still looks straight?

yeah, that's right. the derailleur itself broke. hell if I know how that happened.

Apparently Shimano has a 2 year warranty on all components (aside from Dura-Ace, 3 years). Here's hoping their warranty process isn't overly cumbersome and/or time consuming.

Hump Day Cyclocross Hump Awesomeness

This photo sums up how totally awesome Cyclocross is.


Bartlett CX 4B's
Originally uploaded by Luke

Bartlett Chicrosscup

Why do I look pissed, angry at the world? Not because I've managed to isolate the source of my lower back pains and have resolved it, not because I just got passed... because I totally screwed up the sprint for the hole shot by not clipping in quick enough and not being as aggressive as I should be.

As seems to be the case, I was slowly and steadily picked up and dropped by several riders through the three laps in my 4b's race, which wouldn't have bothered me if I hadn't been 20th+ at the first corner. I almost puked three different times, and every time I looked down at my Garmin, it further confirmed that I was "doing it right", with an average 183bpm on the course.

I finished in the top half, 37th our of 73 starters. 7 places away from points that would have helped the team's overall standings, but it was still a fun race. I've found my ability to corner at speed while staying off the brakes, and seem to have figured out what kind of tire pressure I can run in order to keep the tire on the rim. Those two combined to give me some pretty good efficiency through the technical sections - I was making ground on people and felt really good about the race. The "heckle hill" run-up was a different story - A knobbier rear would have helped as I was spinning out 3/4 of the way up the hill pretty much every time. I'll definitely be throwing my other set of tires in the trunk just in case the St. Charles race is similarly muddy.


Looking at me next to the other guys out there, it's safe to say that I'm the biggest guy in the race. Sure, I've got surplus kilos on me, but don't we all this time of year? Right after I finished and was dry heaving, a Bicycle Heaven rider dismounted and laid in the grass next to his buddies. As he's laying there, panting...

Rider: "Man, I couldn't catch that big xXx dude..."
Buddy: "Which one?"
Rider: "The fat fucker, on the Yellow Trek, man - I just couldn't get him!"
Me: "Uh, are you talking about me?"
Buddy: "Dude, he's right over there."
Rider (Rolls over to see me standing 15 feet away): "Oh yeah - dude, I couldn't catch you! Good riding"

I can only imagine where that conversation would have gone without my interjection. All I have to say about the situation is that if I had the body mass of that guy, there's a lot more people who wouldn't have been able to catch "the big xXx dude...on the yellow trek".

In other news, I didn't break anything!

Cyclocross = Awesome

Excellent Article from Luke in Today's Chicago Tribune...

http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/events/chi-0924-cyclocrosssep24,0,2801142.story

Go buy a paper. When you're done reading it, use it inside your jersey instead of a namby-pamby wind vest.

Jackson Park Cyclocross Race Report

See the race on MotionBased: http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/activity/6817646

after 30 minutes of pain

xXx's Cyclocross offering in Jackson Park kicked off the Chicago Cross Cup for 2008. I arrived plenty early so I could watch the hour-long Pro/1/2 race - I wanted to see how experienced cross racers would ride the course - what lines they took approaching barricades, etc.

Heeding Randy's advice from the previous week, I pre-rode the ~1.25mi course twice. Generally flat, it provided some rather technical off-camber turns into barricades, 180 degree turns transitioning pavement to grass, and long straightaways allowing for passing. The course was generally narrow enough to make passing difficult outside of the straightaways, so I knew that positioning at the start would be critical to avoiding the inevitable traffic jam as the peleton headed into the first narrow section.

I managed to line up on the second row, inside at the start - at the time it seemed like the 4a group was big when I watched the start of that race, but now it seemed like there were MORE guys in the 4b race.

Dave Fowkes gave us our pre-race speech and started us off. The rider ahead of me clipped in properly and was off like a rocket - I was able to do the same and followed his wheel out of the start/finish area. I charged hard into the first narrow section, somewhere around 8th wheel. As I wound through, I caught the jam-up in my peripheral vision and charged ahead. I approached the off-camber-dismount-into-a-barricade and popped off the bike perfectly, somehow. I suitcased the bike up to the next barricade instead of rolling it (was yelled at for this), cleared the second barricade and remounted, clipped in, and was off again. Never had I so cleanly mounted/dismounted before. I was about 10th wheel when I came to the third barricade and dropped my chain... tried being uber-PRO and shift it back on, but it wasn't happening. I grabbed the chain, pitched it onto the small ring, and got back on the bike. I dropped my chain on that same spot 2 laps later... not sure what I was doing wrong. After the first chain drop I knew I was mid-pack and that it was unlikely I'd catch up, so I settled into a tempo and rode, trying to keep from being passed any further.

On the last lap, the intensity caught up with me and I just had no gas left in the tank but I pushed it out as hard as I could. On the back half, Guy Graves yelled "MOVE YOUR ASS ITS THE LAST LAP" which found me with more energy, somehow... knowing that there was a decent pavement section before the finish, I shifted into my 53x24 and stood on it, sprinting like there was no tomorrow - I hit the pavement and worked through the gears, hitting the grass again around 22-23mph and passing 2 or 3 riders in disbelief. I almost puked about 15 seconds after that last effort but held it back. Puke smell doesn't come out of bar tape, so I'm told.

My goal for the race was to survive, finishing without breaking anything. The bike's ok, I'm ok, and it was fun.

Before I raced, I wasn't sure if I'd like cyclocross. I found that answer in Jackson Park. :)

Luke's Race Photos




crossposted at: http://www.xxxracing.org/index.php?/site/reports/jackson_park_cyclocross/

Fun with the Cross Bike

Today was quite the day. Since Gustav's remnants are dumping copious amounts of water all over the midwest you'd think it wasn't a good saturday to ride... au contraire. The original plan was to meet at the Lincoln/Damen Starbucks at 6:30 and ride from there. Since my contact about the *$ meet was Jeff and I had gotten a bail-text from him around 6:05 I had my reservations about leaving the house at all. I got in touch with Boggs who was still waiting at *$ and decided to kit up and get moving. It was completely worth it. I met the others and we rode up Lincoln a ways until I asked what route we were taking that involved so much of Lincoln... nobody had an answer so I took the lead and steered us westbound onto Lawrence en route to Devon/Milwaukee. When we got there, we noticed that the field below the toboggan slides was covered in water - some small patches of grass still visible though.

I've never been disappointed by Randy's clinics and this was no exception to that rule - we covered dismounting, mounting, dismount-barrier-mount, as well as group starts. I'd hoped for better results in the group starts but couldn't seem to get my damned shoes to clip in - I'm spoiled by SPD-SL and it's easy cleat-pedal interface. A normal portion of this clinic involves hill run-ups, but the growing lake in the field below us didn't allow for it. Too bad, shouldering the bike for no apparent reason just isn't quite the same.

At the end of the clinic, this is what we saw at the entrance to the N Branch Trail.

When we arrived, the picnic tables in the pavilion were visible, though water was covering the concrete pad below them - the dumpster serving the pavilion had some water around the base of it... when we left, water had all but topped the dumpster, and the tops of the picnic tables were covered. The North Branch Trail had at least 4' of water over it. An intrepid group of us tried to go north via Milwaukee>Harts Road but found Harts to be covered with rapidly flowing water... not sure exactly how deep it was, but you could definitely feel it pushing on your wheels upon riding through it. Since it would prove difficult to find decent non-flooded trails, we opted to grab a coffee to warm up for the ride home. Along the way we saw several railroad underpasses where cars were being towed out of the water - we also discovered that potholes lie under standing water several times, but luckily none of us flatted.

After I got home, I lounged around a bit and dried out since I had been wet for ~5 hours straight. Around 4 I set out to run some errands and took the cross bike back out. Nothing's quite as fun as putting sopping wet shoes onto dry socks, let me tell you.

As I was heading north along the deserted LFP around Belmont I figured I'd take advantage of the space and continue to practice dismounting/mounting the bike. After several successful rounds, one round that failed miserably (messr bag caught on saddle, oops), and another attempt that led to me face down in a puddle, I figured I'd get moving and finish playing in the mud. As I shifted, I heard some sad noises from my rear derailleur and felt my chain tension against something - not good. I looked back to find this gift from the cycling Gods:

Yeah, that's my rear derailleur. Fuct. Hardcore. Hangar bent 90 degrees all to hell, upside down like it's a trapeze artist or some shit. Sweet.

At this point, it really starts to rain. Thanks.

I snap a few pictures (naturally), whip out the multitool and get to work - hangar needs to come off, cabling removed from shifter & de-routed from lugs, you name it. I stuff everything into my bag while looking for my chain tool... which isn't there. Rock. On. So much for a cassette singlespeed solution to get home. I try to tension the chain across the 53x26 but that's just not happening - every time I put pressure on the cranks, the chain jumps around on the cassette all crazy-like. Chain's gotta come off. The rain lets up a bit.

Solution? Put this morning's skills clinic to the test. I tried running and mounting, but that's all kinds of hard to do when the crank is spinning freely - pedal smashing into my opposite shin, which is pretty cool. Next option, clip into one side and kick myself along with the opposite leg... this option worked best... one leg gets tired, coast it out and switch, the kick along some more. I made it to the Roscoe tunnel and hailed a cab on the other side. Cabbie not so thrilled about muddy wet bike-dude getting into his cab and he made no effort whatsoever to get my bike into his cab. After aborting that attempt at getting to a shop I realized I was only 2 blocks away from Belmont... as I'm scooting along I see a #77 sitting at the light... who knows when the next one will come, so I hop off, shoulder the bike, and run.

Pedestrians really don't know how to react when they see a sopping wet 6'6" dude with a bike on his shoulder running at them. Some, wisely, get the hell outta the way. Others stop like deer in headlights.

I made it to the bus, got the bike to a shop, and it's there for the night. Hopefully they can call me tomorrow with a full assessment of the damages. I need this bike up and running for next Sunday's race, so here's hoping the repairs are relatively straightforward... and that I don't need a new rear derailleur.