Race Reports: 1999 NorCal district championship
Feb 2000
Introduction For two years I have avoided putting personal commentary on this site, on the premise that "everyone has an opinion" (as Clint Eastwood says) and mine are no more interesting than another's. But I always like reading other people's race reports, and a number of people have told me that they enjoy mine. So what the heck, I thought I would put them up here. If you don't have an interest in this--just click outta here. --Dave Carr 1999 NorCal
District CX
Championships
Fort Ord,
Monterey
County
11/27/99NCNCA District Criterium, er, Cyclocross Championship
Fort Ord, Master 30+For years district CX championships have been held in January, usually contested by a mere handful of cyclocross stalwarts. But for '99, with Natz coming up in San Francisco, we managed to schedule districts at a more appropriate time. As a result we got the biggest and best fields in memory for a district CX. For example, in Master 30+ alone we had 70 riders, and a high quality field including Kevin Merrigan (winner of Surf City #1 in the A's); Todd Hoefer (2nd A at SCCX #1); Rob "Buckwheat" Meighan, fresh off a string of Master's podium finishes at SuperCup races; Eli Rowe (recent winner of Central Coast CX #3 in M30+); me, a 30.5 year old "pup master"; and more. With the quick course at Fort Ord this looked to be a super fast race.
The circuit, as I noted above, was more like a crit course than a 'cross course. (See Mark Weaver's rant on the subject.) Approximately 80% pavement, with little elevation gain, a little sand, and no severe runups, this course was one for the speed demons. Skinny tires, pumped hard, were the order of the day. For example, Todd ran 28c Speedmax at 105 psi, I had my Michelin Sprints at 80, and Buckwheat had sewup Tufo's with a light file tread. Someone in M30+ even had road tires on. The equipment of choice was definitely not a mountain bike. Watching the preceding group, the B's, fly around the course in a tight pack of 15 or 20, it was apparent that the race would be all about making the front split. With a sea breeze in your face on much of the course, and a real benefit for drafting, there would be no hope for those who lost contact.
These thoughts were in my mind as we blasted off full speed down the long paved straight into the first sandy barriers. 70 guys scrambling for position is not a pretty sight. After the barrier, up a short rise, a chicane into a tricky dismount, a descent through sand, and a couple paved turns into the only runup. This was a shallow grade with three small hoppable barriers. Fortunately, bunnyhopping didn't seem to benefit anyone, as the blazing pace punished any mistakes. Only Joe McNerney (on his K2 MTB) consistently hopped, and he didn't gain any time with it. Actually, with so much riding it was nice to get off and run once in a while. After the runup came some more climbing which opened a few gaps, then some up and down, a 35 mph paved descent, a hard left turn, and a long straight into the wind. Finally a right hairpin on sand, 300m pavement, the final barriers, and 200m road sprint to the finish. Long laps by distance, but only 6-7 minutes on time.
As predicted, the split in M30+ came early and within two laps a group of 8 was gone for good, including Merrigan, Hoefer, me, Rowe, Mark Howland, McNerney, Buckwheat, and one other I don't know. We were flying, though the pace slowed from time to time as many of the guys were marking Kevin and Buckwheat. At crit race pace it was like a pinball machine in that pack. Guys were bumping, going down, botching bunnyhops -- it wasn't pretty. I tried an attack on lap four, but caught a tire on a sidewalk edge and went down. Buckwheat hung up on a barrier attempting a bunnyhop. Eli Rowe went too hot into a sandy dismount and biffed. Etc. etc.
One to go and we're all together. McNerney attacked after the first dismount and Kevin, leading and unwilling to tow, watched him go. It would be embarassing to let a mountain biker win this crit cross districts... Todd Hoefer took up the charge, counterattacking through the runup with Kevin. I followed McNerney, hoping he would bridge across, with Buckwheat and Howie right behind. The last half lap was sick. McNerney surged. Buckwheat surged. Coming into the last dismount I attacked and led the barrier, and sprinted. Up ahead, Kevin just nipped Todd for the win. I held off the others for third ot 0:05...yee haw! I expected Buckwheat to come around but I'm guessing he was a little burned out from doing all those SuperCup races, plus biffing the barrier.
Behind us, I didn't see results in M40+ (run concurrently, 1 minute back) but I presume Larry Hibbard won it. I'm just glad he didn't catch the 30's! In 50+, John Elgart latched onto a bunch of the 40's to win his race, and beat all of 'em in the sprint to boot.
Phew, what a race. After a season of 1 hour races in A's it was nice to finish in 45 minutes. Most of the leaders decided to skip the afternoon A race -- one dose of suffering was enough. See you at Natz!
Cheers
Dave Carr
Napa Valley Velo
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