Orchard Cross at Applecrest Farm

I have been blowing this blog off for a while.  Busy with moving to a new home/state, cross racing work, etc.  It was a good outlet and I should try to keep it up.  Anyway...

So I did another cyclocross bike race this weekend, as I have been every weekend or two since September.  This one was really fun, and prompted me to post something to share.

Drove down to South Hampton NH, about an hour and a half away.  Pleasant drive though my old Ipod crashed and would not play music, as happens when I leave it in the car on a cold night.

Got to the event plenty early.  Was there at 8:00 even though my race was not until 10:30.  That gave me time for a lap on the course before the first race, another afterward, and half a lap just before the third.  A good solid warm up!  We did not get the promised deluge (that is coming tonight) so the course was was a bit wet due to this week's rain, but not really muddy or exceptionally mucky.  Mostly just wet or damp grass, with a few short sections of medium density mud. 

Course was a dirt (grass) track date My kind of riding!  No run up, no sand pit, not many technical sections.  Just let em rip!

There was one section of pump track, which was fun.  This is where most of the spectators hung out, to see the excitement.  A bunch of single jumps and a double...

A couple of mini-berms

Another set of single/doubles...

And then a full on BMX style berm

This was followed by an slight uphill track back, then a downhill on a smaller set of whoop-de-doos.  You could ride down this section no brakes if you were daring, but it was like hanging on to the back of a bucking bronco as your bike rode up and back down.

More riding through grass around the apple orchard and through the raspberry bushes back to the start.  We did 5 laps, and even though I was behind the middle of the field, I didn't get passed by the leaders, which is pretty good!

Had an awesome race, placed 23/41, which is the best results I have had so far this year.  And I had a ton of fun, which was the important part.

There were a few races I could have done today.  I decided last minute that rather than do two serious races, I would do the "Costume Race" as my second :)  I didn't have a costume ready, but at the last minute, I did some internet searching and came up with a brainstorm!  Spent 5 minutes cutting up a box, 5 minutes gluing, and 10 minutes painting, and lo and behold, I was LEGO MAN!!!

There must have been 40-50 folks lined up in costume.  Gumby/pokey, prom queens, monsters, maine lobsters and lobster fisherman/women, lots of great costumes!

This guy probably took the cake for going all in, though he struggled to keep the bike moving later in the race.

The costume race was a mellow affair, not scored and not really a race.  I moved at a decent pace to get a workout in, and passed a few riders, making sure that it was OK if I went by them first.