Date: November 28, 2010
Location: Riverdale Park, Toronto, Ontario
This was my first off-road bike race in over 10 years. Having originally started racing mountain bikes and later moving over to road (triathlons mainly) I forgot how much off-road racing hurts and how fun it is.
Major knee surgery in February stopped me from running this year so no triathlons this year but I have been able to ride. The night after my surgery someone broke into the shed in our backyard and stole my commuter bike. When I got around to replacing it I thought I might as well get a Cross bike to commute on and race a little bit in the fall. See how easy it is to justify why you need yet another sport specific bike:-) Last weekend was my first Cylco-Cross race and wow was it hard.
For those that don’t what cyclo-cross races typically take place in the autumn and winter and consists of many laps of a short (2.5–3.5 km) course featuring pavement, wooded trails, grass, steep hills and obstacles requiring the rider to quickly dismount, carry the bike while navigating the obstruction and remount. Races are generally between 30 minutes and an hour long, with the distance varying depending on the ground conditions.
The riding I have done in triathlons and road races really didn’t translate very well to this type of racing. Because the races are short people go really hard and by the time I got to the top of first climb I had lactic acid seemingly coursing through every muscle in my body. For those of you who don’t know Riverdale Park it is the one you see on the east side of the Don Valley Parkway south of Bloor and we climbed from the bottom to the top of that hill twice per lap! I was able to ride up the first time but by the 2nd lap I didn’t have the skill or strength to climb it again, so carried my bike up. I wasn’t the only one doing this and it is often the fastest way up depending on the climb. Though I have nothing to compare it too talking to a few racers after said it was a very hard course so at least it wasn’t just me. Though it was a nice day and I don’t remember it raining much in the days before the race the course was really wet and muddy which made things pretty slick on the climbs. Fortunately I only fell once but with all of the mud I was having troubles clipping into my pedals for the majority of the race. The changes of surfaces from gravel to grass to mud and jumping barriers definitely kept things interesting and fun. The race was 5 laps and I was caught by the leaders on my 4th so my race ended there but I can’t say that I was upset that I didn’t get to go and do another lap. I was done and couldn’t face pushing my bike up that hill again.
It was a great experience and if you get a chance you should really give one a try. They are very low key events but that doesn’t mean the top people aren’t really fast. The organizers put on a really great event. The really nice thing is that there are a lot of them in Toronto parks throughout the fall so you don’t have to drive very far to do one.
I will be heading out for my 2nd race the Subway Cross this weekend at Old Mill, hopefully I don’t get lapped again this week.
