CO Racing

Courtney and I headed out to CO for some fun Halloween weekend racing at the Colorado Cross Classic and the Boulder Cup. Our costumes were kinda lame... just a couple of cyclists. But the racing was super fun! The first day brought lots and lots of sand. There was so much sand that the UCI officials forced some of the sandy course to be cut out. That's a lot of sand. I got off to a great start but quickly discovered that breathing is hard a mile above sea level... the rest of the race I got passed and passed and passed... I held on for the last UCI points in tenth. Not too bad with a field of top riders, but it is really not fun getting passed the whole race.

The next day, I thought maybe I should start a little more conservatively so that I don't get passed throughout the race. Here is a picture of the start... Sure it says Gould gets the whole shot... but it fails to mention that Devon is very very close behind... which is not a conservative start. Oh well, that is a dumb idea anyway to start conservatively in cross.

Moments after the start, we fly over an island in the middle of the straightaway and I hear a "crunch" as I come off the curb -- not a good sound when riding a carbon bike on carbon wheels. I didn't have time to analyze the situation as the race was on (but it turns out my wheel... which is supposed to be very strong... broke coming off that curb... so so sad. luckily it held up enough for me to finish the race on it).

Next the race takes a sharp off camber turn and this mess happens -- my coach describes it as a "cat 4 pile up". The corner was trickier than it looks.

Crashes happened all over the course. I think a lot of people came away with a little less skin... but it was a fun course and a fun crowd. Check out the guy in the monster suit! At the end of the day I just missed the top 5 and finished with a 6th place... behind a lot of strong CO riders.

Overall a fun weekend. Plus I got to see family (my father and bro-in-laws were crushing it on the courses) and friends. Cross+Good People=Good Times.