Cross Crusade. Holy Shit.

I raced Saturday at Emigrant Lake, near Ashland, Oregon and Sunday at the Cross Crusade race at Estacada near Portland. My actual racing was hardly worthy of mention. My bike worked, it didn't break, my body worked, I finished without a great deal of pain, and my Dugast Rhinos performed admirably. The course at Emigrant Lake was jungle cross almost more suited to a mountain bike than a cross bike. I survived. The course at Estacada was fun. Mostly grass, some single track, some off camber, some mud, two muddy downhills with runups that the accomplished racers rode up and a little bit of pavement. The course was long, 2.4 miles. I probably rode too conservatively. I started easy to pace myself and never really pushed it. I felt tired at the end but not spent. They start the beginners and 50+ masters at 9:00 a.m. so I was there early. I got a parking spot right in the middle of all the action. When I finished I was amazed at everything that had been set up while I was racing. Cross Crusade is not just a race. It's an event. There were vendors and bike shops and manufacturers there with booths. There was food and beer. I found the beer tent right after I finished. It was PBR but it was FREE. That's right FREE BEER. I had two PBRs before I spotted a guy with a dark colored liquid in his cup. I asked him where he got it and he took me to the Cross Crusade motorhome where they had Pyramid Snow Cap Ale. Much better and also FREE. Do they have free beer at the cross races in Wisconsin?

I couldn't get a good picture that showed everything. If you enlarge the picture you can see Vanilla Bicycles, White Industries and Retrotec Bicycles.











I took this picture of parts of the course from near the beer tent. Standing there made me realized that, during the race, I have absolutely no idea where I am other than on the course. In the top left of the picture is an off camber section that kind of bothered me. I had no idea it was so close to this downhill section and runup.







There were lots of interesting people there. It was a little crazy at times. It was lots of fun and I left before noon. I bet it got a lot more fun. I don't think I'm exaggerating to say there were thousands of people there. There was more racing for the rest of the day. As I was driving away about every third car on the highway had bikes on top.







It was supposed to rain all weekend but it didn't rain during either of the days I raced. We drove home from Portland on Monday and it rained hard. It was scary on the Interstate. It frightens me enough just passing the big trucks but when they're throwing up so much water that, for a couple of seconds you can't see anything, it absolutely terrifies me. We made it though.

Next Saturday is the final race of the Outlaw Cyclocross series, again, at Emigrant Lake. Sunday is the final Cross Crusade race in Portland but I don't think I'll go. We're going to Portland for Thanksgiving and driving there three weekends in a row is too much. I'm going to race in Eugene Saturday on the way home after Thanksgiving.