I know most people have no idea how hard cross is, but these pictures tell 1000 words! I was hurting from the start to right to the very end.
out

Well, Starcross was quite the production this year! Went down with Cressman and we decided to leave at 10:15 to get there for a 5:00 pm race. Well, given that our dollar is worth as much as the greenback everyone had to go shopping on Saturday. Now I know this has nothing to do with Cross, but humour me. The dollar has been floating around parity for months now, almost 3 months. The difference on a 1000.00 purchase would be 50.00, compared to a month ago? That is worth sitting in line at the boarder for 2-3 hours? Anyhow, back to Starcross. Our boarder delay was not too bad, but it was still 2 hours. Cressman is an interesting cat, so we chatted about a big range of stuff and generally solved the world’s biggest issues on the way down to Redmond.
We get there and we try to get kitted up and hit the course for a quick lap prior to the start of the master B’s race. No dice we go 150 metres and they announce the B’s have started. There are some guys from the Vancouver area in the race and I can tell they are doing well and sure enough, one of the guys that I race with and with whom I battle back and forth with wins, handily I might add. That is cool, but perhaps he should be racing with the Men ½ (actually he did the next day’s race and killed it for a top 10)
I manage to get on quick lap in prior to the start of my race and do most of it with Christian Huele, he is the number 5 ranked rider in the world and reigning Swiss champ. Funny in warm up he was no faster than me? Get to the start area and I get a second row start. I line up against multiple US National Champion Rich Feldman. We chat about how nice his carbon Colnago cross bike is and that would be the last I ever saw of him because he tore everyone’s legs off and killed EVERYONE!
My race was interesting as I got a pretty good start, but burned off a lot of matches to stay up near the front. I was riding pretty comfortable, but the pace was brisk to say the least. I was hurting right from the start and I knew that the course was bumpy, but man was it bumpy. I just had a hard time really getting consistent on that track. I really like the track, but there are a lot of changes of pace, I prefer something a bit less up and down in terms of effort. Having said that we are all racing the same course and all have to battle the same elements. For the first 3 laps I ride well keeping it in the top 15, but on about lap four I come around a 180 on the pavement and too hot and actually slide out and slide in to the only puddle on the course. So, now I am the only guy who is riding wet on the course. A few guys got by me after that as it took me a few minutes to get my sh!t collected, but once I did I made back some guys. Then I started getting stomach cramps by being bounced around like crazy. I must have had too much liquid in my stomach. For a while there I thought about bailing. Guys were sitting on me and then coming around me after and I was having a hard time staying with them and then I would end up between groups. With 3 to go (I think it is all a bit of a blur) I was counted by the UCI official as 21. I held that within 3-4 places I believe.
Not a great day, but a great venue that just punishes me. Starcross is the type of course that will point out your strengths and weakness really quick. I think that is why I love it so much.
In the women’s race, Kelly Jones from Vancouver rode an amazing race staying with the lead group of Wendy Williams, Wendy Simms (also from BC) and Rachael Lloyd to finish an amazing 6th place. Right there the whole time, but came up short in last 1000 metres of the race. Nice to see.
Men’s race. Too many highlights to list. Kabush rolls his tire early and does not have a bike or wheels so he makes his way to the barriers where the beer garden is and downs 4 beers!!! Then steps off the course. The guy is all class. If you can’t represent your sponsors by racing fast, then do it by drinking with the fans. Chris Sheppard raced after serving out his 2-year suspension for EPO use and finished 7th starting from the back and bringing back a pretty elite group of men. He raced strong and I would have presumed clean, let’s hope that never changes. Then there was the Trebon, Wicks and Huele story. The 3 big men off the front. The 2 Kona boys tried to lay wood to him, but he never looked like he was breathing. I think it takes more than the twin towers to bring down a guy like Huele. He played it perfect, by getting position on the Treefarm in the last corner and winning the sprint. Wicknasty tried the sweetest move, he came up high on the velodrome and dropped in passing Huele and Trebon re-entering the infield, it got away on him as he was too hot for the corner and stacked it. Then he chased back to the 2 leaders.
A lot of guys raced the next day in Seattle, but not me. We got home at about 1:00 am and I just chilled with the family.

Starcross

Well tomorrow is Starcross. Checked the confrimed riders in the master 1/2 category. there are some big hitters. Dale Knapp? Damn!? Rich Feldman, McClugg? Geez, these guys are all super fast. I am excited and nervous all at the same time. This race is really training so riding "up" is way better than riding at a level where you know even on a bad day you are probably not going to be out of the top 15. tomorrow, I could be out of the race early if I ride bad. If I ride well I should be able to stay on the same lap. If I ride out of my socks, then who knows!
Driving up Creeeesman which will be good. I was going to go Han Solo, but that is boring especially when I am driving back at 11:00 pm passing out from being sh!t bagged. Hope I get some sort of descent call up. I have been getting the fire cracker starts lately and I want to keep that going if I can. I would rather go out big and fade a bit than go out soft and pick it up. Having said that you never want to go soft in any circumstance....anyway, I just hope it is a clean run for the first lap. Not like last year when guys could not get up and over the wooden overpass and were getting off. That is a sign that you were not ready for the race at all.
B.C. is going to Vegas after Starcross, what a baller that guy is. He told me he is going to rent a Hummer to carry all of his peelers in the back, should be sweet. I hope the girls have room with all the carbon wheels he is going to have back there.
Talked to D.B. the other day. He is reno-ing his house. Sounds like fun! A.M.S. said it is like little Beruit at their place right now.
The Fashionista has gone all Nocturnal on us.

Waiting it out.

Waiting for my daughter to fall asleep. She usually falls asleep at 8:00 pm, it is 10:00 and she has called us in 10 times and she is in her bed just talking, singing and whinning. I feel bad for her, but man can she come up with the reasons not to want to fall asleep. Kids have the best imaginations! Oh well, it is all part of it. This is about the worst I can remember it being in a while. Not sure what is up. I have to end this as I am being called about covering some toes.....
Legs came back pretty good from Saturday. I painted a bedroom most of the day on Sunday ( rained most of the day ) I wonder if Wellens or Nys paint their kids room after having a great race? That is one way to know that you race for the love of it and not the glory. Well, not in this house anyway. Okay,the toes are really an issue now, gotta fly!

Delta Cross

Lined up for the cross race in North Delta, BC. It is not a BC Cup, however I am thrilled about there being another race on the calender. Good course, one of the bigger pure fitness tests given that there is a long hill ( for cross anyway ) with some fun technical sections in the woods. They started the race from the bottom of the long gravel road, this year, and you hit the climb right at the start and that thins it out nicely.

Given that it is not a BC Cup race, they broke out a masters category! This is a good idea only because it breaks the field size down a bit. They start the B's in front of the masters, we go 1 minute later. I am lined up on the front line with the usual fast guys. They say go and Brad initially goes to the front, after he leads it out I come through and I am leading up the climb. We hit the top of the climb and I am scared to look back as I have a feeling that I just towed the whole group up the hill. I look back once at the top of the climb and BC is on my wheel and that is about all I can see. I feel pretty good at the top of the climb and just try to stay smooth riding in the track. We end up hitting the technical single track first and it is nice being at the front unobstructed. Hit the barriers and I can tell there is a pretty good group with me. I still get over the barriers first and then manage to get over the big hoppable log first as well. We hit the long fast downhill and no one comes by me, I am bit surprised because I am not going as fast as I can because it is a hard right at the bottom that is all loose gravel and don't want to crash. After that we hit the long drag to the start finish line. I give BC the chicken wing to come around, as I am hurting a bit. He does and like last week he almost kills me. I come back around and we hit the climb. I look back and I can see that I have a gap. I decide that I should give it a go! I get clear on the climb and by the top I have a sizable gap.

I ride the whole second and third lap pretty fast knowing that others will be coming. I want to try to stay on it so I can stay away until the end. I know that if I keep this pace up I may slow up towards the end. I ride laps 2-3 fast and smooth. When I come around, after 3, I see 2 to go. I know that I am starting to hurt. I can tell by the way that I am riding the climb. I am not as smooth or as powerful I look back and there are guys behind me and, however I can't tell if they are B's that I have caught or guys that are in my group. I seem to be riding pretty well in the technical which is encouraging. Trying to pedal through all the corners.

I see one to go and it looks like a possibility, I may get the win going wire to wire. Then it happens, just as I see the lap board a guy tags on the back of me and as we start the climb he goes around me. I am in the pain cave. Not much left, but I go absolutely red! As he went by me he told me Tyler Morland was coming at 10 seconds. I manage to stay on the first guys wheel, but he gaps me off to about 4 feet, but I hold it there. The parts are coming off the jalopy at this point. Then just as we hit the top of the climb Tyler comes by me. It is almost all flat or downhill. I tag onto Tyler and we are making up time on the other guy. It might be close, but after we hit the long gravel descent that takes us onto the long drag back to the start finish, Tyler lays the wood to me. That is it! The other guy stays away, I roll it in for 3rd. Missed it by about 5 minutes. 15 seconds between 1-3rd

I had it. I think that I just lost some focus on laps 3-4. It is hard riding by yourself for all 5 laps. I almost pulled it off, which I think would have been an upset. Ah well, it was lots of fun. The other 2 rode a great race, so no shame in third.

Nina and the fashionista were out to the race. Nina said that Sophia was cheering for the wrong guy every lap. I hope he was a Dad too! Nina did not snap any pictures, she would have, had she known I was leading for 95% of the race, but could not tell with all the B's starting in front of us. She never said it but, probably thought that I was pack fodder.

Next up is star crossed!!! Should be fast

missed the V by 4 mintes....

more later.................

Karate? You don't need Karate, you can just ring their necks....

Today was the start of the BC Cup Series. It kicked off at Fort Langley. Good turn out all around for the race and the weather was like summer. No need for the heat balm ( who told you to put the balm on? I didn't tell you to put no balm on, do you know what balm does? ) today, it was cooking. Rode the track for a couple of laps and got to witness some suffering going on in the C race. They changed the course this year. There used to be a ball buster of a run, but they took most of it out and cut in some tough switchbacks instead. At the start of the uphill run they had a set of 2 barriers. This all led to a steep Euro shoot and then a log as a barrier that I would guess 90% of people hopped.
Still no masters category this year, just good old A B C, which is fine, but it brings a wide range in the B category. I get a front line starting position with a few guy that I don't remember racing in the top 10 before, but for the most part it was the usual suspects. Gun goes and I get an okay start, but I could not get my foot in that pedal to save my life. I finally get cliced in and we are rounding a sketch turn ( with 56 people in a pack it was a bit sketch ) and I wait for the fire works. There is some guy about 50 meters ahead riding away. No one is riding. I go to bridge up and don't look back, I managed to pass this guy and I am the first one through the single track across the creek and up to the run up. i am towing a few guys with me, but I am pretty happy to be near the front coming into the run up and the climbing single track near the front. One guy gets by me as we are going oer the barriers and about 5 of us are gone. My buddy Brad is there, a guy from Natural Earth is there, a Masi guy is there. There are 3 guys in front of me and Brad, we are tapping it out pretty good. I am riding the uphill paved section, he is riding the long gravel road to the start finish. The first time that he came around me on the start finish line straight he almost killed me. With 3 to go Brad said that a Seattle guy from Ticycles was briding. We did not go deep to stay away, we just kept rolling. He got to us and came by. At first neither or us reacted, but I did not want to let him go, so I went across to him, Brad followed. I got on him and stayed on him pretty good,, but I can't remember what happened, but he got a bit of a gap and I let him go....about 6 feet, and as they say you get dropped 6 feet at a time in cross. He was right there, so we kept it pretty steady, 2 to go I came around Brad in a sandy section and kind popped my self. Some confusion to me as we had lapped a guy in Mighty Riders kit a lap earlier, but now he seemed to be back and went by me going over the barriers? I was WTF? did he tag onto the back of our group? Well he gapped me to, and now Brad is in front of me and so is this guy. Turns out he came up with the Ticycles guy and it was a teammate we had lapped. I am in about 7th place now. I stay on it hard for the last lap and I am making up time on 4-6th, but I am running out of time. Then things get worse, as I am passing a lapped rider he stumbles on the short run up and tells me to go, when I go he starts getting up and whacks me with his bike? On the paved uphill I can see Brad, no catching him, then I see the mighty guy. At this point we are mixed in with some of the lapped A women. I am dodging bodies everywhere basically riding on the centre line. I come around the second to last corner and 6th place is there. I weave through some women and there he is. He doesn't know that I am there, so I leave a small gap and then I start my sprint, it is close, but with a bike throw I get it!
Brad got 4th because the Ticycles guy dropped his chain or something. Brad does not even remember passing him. 6th, not too bad! Happy with that. Brad was happy w/4th!
A race, not sure who won, but they were rolling it fast!!! Rob Britton did not win and that surprised me a bit, I think he flatted and still finished 3rd.
In the womens race "the" Alison Sydor showed up to take the A race, but not without a fight from Kelly Jones. Kelly said that she let her go after 2 or 3 laps. Both women caught a lot of the B's. No women close to Kelly after that.
My 2 women went to a brithday party at a petting zoo and the Fashionista rode a pony!
Nina had the hotwater tank go, while I was gone. First she panicked then she found the shut off in the house( I am not sure I knew where it was) and shut down the water! Damn, smart, pretty and handy!!! no water right now, so I am having some wine. I think the form is getting better! However, that may be the wine talking.....

The cross bike!

Here is my cross bike for this year. It is a Redline team frame made out of Scandium tubing, with a richey WCS full carbon fork. The parts for the drivetrain are mostly 10 speed Dura Ace. The wheels are Mavic Reflex rims with Tufo Flexus tubular tires. The rear hub is an Italian FRM carbon. I run a single ring set up with an FSA carbon gaurd.
I use a 42 ring up front and a 12-27 in the rear. If you can't get up a hill with that then it is time to start running, it will be faster. The brakes are Empella Froglegs.
My friend Brad helped me spec it and he basically was nice enough to do the build for me. He has a big passion for cross, check out how he routed the front brake off of the stem. Slick! I have not weighed it, but it is somewhere in the 16 pound range. I have some carbon wheels that I may glue some tubulars to, that may skim off some weight, but with this set up I can run about 30psi and if I wreck them it will cost me 60.00 vs. 300.00, plus the time to get the new rim.

MIA

I haven’t touched this thing in a long time! I set it up originally to do cross updates and then got carried away updating it like I was Todd Wells or someone who actually is fast on their bike. Since I went to Europe I have not had a ton of time getting updates on, but I will be good from here on in.
So, I hit my first cross race of the year this year. I raced down in Seattle at South SeaTac. This is my second time racing out there and it is a super well-organized race. I went down with my friends Brad and his wife…actually not wife, but close enough, Kelly and we all raced.
The course has a ton of sand on it and it is pretty technical for a cross course with a lot of fun swoopy single track. The course had 2 run ups and one run up that you could ride if you were a solid rider. The second run was a ball buster for sure that put you in the hurt locker for about a minute after the run. There were also some good paved sections to recover or hammer depending on how you were feeling.
Kelly was the first to race. She did not kill it off the front, but she was in the top 3 for the women’s A race. She rolled in 3rd dangling off the back of the first 2 women by a few seconds at most. She was riding the hard ride/run and catching them back, but they would get a gap after. I think she was losing some time on the twisty track to Kristy Berg…Alec Berg…. (Forget it no one will get that), but as they came to the finish Kelly was right there with the other 2 but effectively needed another 1 lap to take the win. She had a strong race, there was only 5 seconds separating 2 and 3rd and then multiple minutes to 4th.
Next me and Brad line up to roll the Master A men. We start about 1:30 behind the Senior elite men. Our laps will be based off of the times of their laps. Great! I get to have my race based on the times of one of the fastest guys in the US, Shannon Skeritt, so I knew I had my work cut out for me. Only about 15 masters racing today and one junior that was staged with the masters.
Start goes okay and then down the start finish area this little guy punches it and everyone is going full gas to a hill that is loose and a bit rocky. I go into about 3rd from last as I got chopped a bit by the junior making a bit of a dumb move. I gotta start throwing elbows more if I want to do a bit better. Anyway, the junior wads it up going up the hill and I have to run about 10 meters while everyone else rides away. I get going and I am pinned struggling to keep my bike going in a straight line. My saving grace is that when we hit the ride/run up, I ride it clean and make some spots there. I get another here or there and don’t ever give anything back. Brad is up a bit, I can see him early and he must be in the top three. On lap 2 I ride better and on lap 3 I am riding everything fast making more passes. I hit the run and I can see Brad in front of me. He has about 15 seconds on me. It is deceiving because it looks like I can reach him by digging in deep, but when I get to the top he his gone. I drill it on the pavement and I am making up time and then as we hit the start finish he wheels in and grabs a wheel. Makes sense, as I was catching him really quick and I thought that those million dollar carbon wheels he was using might have let out some air. Turns out that it was not flat, but really soft.
Last couple of laps went well, but as I was getting close to finishing off my second last lap I could see a guy in Team Vanilla kit coming in on me. Damn! One of the Elite men. If he laps me I am done. I get placed, but I am done. I start hauling ass, hit the long run up and giver, but near the top he comes by me, just flying! If I can get on his wheel and ride to the finish and ask him to let me go ahead of him, before we cross the line, then I can finish my last lap! The things you think when your brain has no oxygen. When we hit the paved section after the run the only thing I was doing was praying that I did not blow my entire load right there.
I finished 6th. Brad rolled in about 2.5 minutes later in 7th, very respectable considering the wheel change.
I wasn’t great, but not bad either. The race was almost all single track, so with the exception of the run and the ride/run sections I did not feel like I was on the rivet. It was more about being smooth vs. killing it.
Bike rode perfect. Big thanks to Brad for helping me get it all set up. I am on a Redline, with Dura Ace, this year and it a step up over last years bike.
We hit Langley next weekend for the start of the BC cross series. Should be good. I should be suffering a bit less on the run there seeing how I have done some stair running lately! I figured in Rawlyk can run 2400 km by June, that I could bust out 5 flights of stairs 6-8 times once a week…
R-Enns is 40! Nice work buddy. I am sure that you were puking at some point last weekend.
Went to the most bizarre Asian wedding the night before the race. I have never seen anything like it. Their MC was a hired gun! They had Karaoke going during dinner. Man it was Super Fantastic!!!
Oh, so my loving wife mentioned to me that the bride, for a small girl, had the big rack, well her sister goes that gene as well!!!! I have never seen 100-pound women rolling it with that kind of natural talent. I thought that when she walked into the room the should have busted out some INXS “guns in the sky”