SPIN - Cross your Heart and hope to DIE

John E. and Dave S.,
originally uploaded by gburkhol.

Today's cyclocross race was put on by Spin in Willoughby, OH. I got conned by Mehul into doing the A race since only 2 other people had signed up at the time and they were paying out 10 deep. The final field ended up being about 20 guys. Had I raced the B race, I probably would have had a pretty good chance at placing, since there were only about 5 guys who weren't racing masters.

The race turned out to be a bust for me, since I flatted less than 1/4 mile into the 2nd lap of the 1.8 mile course. The spot where I flatted also claimed Paul Martin on the first lap and Brett Davis around the 4th or 5th lap. It was a dip perpendicular to the course which had gotten muddy and rutted up as the day went on. I had run the spot on the first lap, but tried riding it on lap 2. When my wheel went into the mud, I felt a solid bump and heard hissing. I thought I had pinch flatted at first. I was running a Tufo Elite LPS tubular clincher on the front at about 38 psi. I really didn't think I had hit hard enough to pinch flat, and it turned out that I hadn't. Upon checking the tire there was a 1/2 inch long cut which was at about a 45* angle to the tread. Chalk up another $60 tire tragedy this year.

There were 2 bright sides to flatting though: I avoided the utter PAIN of doing what turned out to be about an hour and 15 minute race for some people, and I was able to take some decent pics of the A race. Pics are posted HERE Needless to say, when Rick saw that I wasn't racing he wasn't too pleased. I had talked him into doing the A race...

I'll give a short description of the course, but I'm thinking John, Ray, or Rick will go into more detail. The start was on pavement, continued up a wide sidewalk, through the parking lot, and to the spot where I flatted. After the dip, there was a run-up with 4 switch backs taking you up and down the side of a hill. The turns were off camber and the climbs didn't have much traction, so several people were running this part.

Then after shooting down you hit a short steep pop over a roadway and around a off camber turn where you had to avoid going into the reeds. Ride out on the grass and switch back along the edge of a gravel parking lot. A well banked turn and a few more turns snaked you through the parking lots down a paved path and back onto the grass. There was a few tight turns and switch backs along the river and a 3 foot high log dismount, which one guy on a MTB was able to bunny. A uphill switchback and then some more turns taking you into a straight stretch with a double barrier leading to the pit area.

After the pit was a few wrapping turns back and forth around some trees. There was a turn around a ball field and a quick switch back and another hard right turn. At this point you could finally open up in the grass for a few hundred feet. Making a couple of sweeping turns brought you up to a point where you rode a little ways up the hill and then had a really off camber switchback across and then down the hill.

Ride out and turn around a light pole and then ride back to the hill. This time you get to go all the way straight up the hill for about 100 feet. There was a barrier 20 feet up the hill to force you to dismount, not like riding this hill was even possible. There was barely enough traction to run up it, and it was STEEP. At the top, you turned right and then right again to remount and plummet down the hill going at least 20mph. 40-50 feet after the bottom there was a switch back on the edge of a ball diamond which was muddy, rutted, and slick. You had to practically lock your brakes up to be able to slow enough from the descent to make the turn.

After the turn, there was a stretch of grass and then a quick jog up a rise, where the traction was a little sketchy. Ride along the top, cut around a pine tree, go down around the fence, to get to another 'S' turn leading onto another muddy ball diamond. Cross behind home plate and keep your momentum from carrying you into the fence while you turned right. You then got to circle to the left past the fence and ride through a picnic shelter where some cool tunes where playin. At this point you were on the pavement which took you past the wheel pit again and through the start/finish.

I hope I painted a nice visual of the pain that this course dealt to those who got to do a complete race on it today. The pics over at Flickr will show you what I mean. Snakebite had a really good showing today with all of our racers doing the A race and with John E claiming 10th place for the final money spot. Awards took place afterwards at the Willoughby brewing company in true CX fashion. Kudos to Greg and the guys from Spin on putting on a great race!

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