by Ed Dunne
About 20-30 men lined up for the Cat4 state cyclocross race. And we were off! There was a hard initial sprint on grass to the first descent and then a hard left, someone went down. The main group dissected around him and went up a steep grade, several off-camber turns and down again through gravel and sand.
Everybody was mostly together, until we went into a wooded area that had deep soft soil with little grass cover. It graded up twice and then back into deep sand, which led into a barn! Through the barn, around the corner and soon we were heading for the first barrier. One barrier, two barrier... Soon there were stairs, one step, two..run, jump, pedal, pedal.
A couple of laps past and I found myself in the lead. I tried to go a little harder to put a bit of space between the following six guys, BUT, On bunny hopping out of the barn at a clip, I turned too hard on a grass corner and the back wheel went out from under me and I was down...One, two, about 5-6 guys rode past. I was a bit dishevaled and disorientated, but I quickly jumped back up on the bike, peddled and discovered my gears were not shifting, yikes! I saw the lead pack leave me. Low and behold the gears starting shifting again, and I was soon catching them.
Caught most folks and began to get into a tempo with the main lead guy. On some of graded portions of the course, I began to pass him and soon I was about 20-30 seconds clear. I kept peddling to the finish line and discovered I had won!
