Cycle-Smart Northampton Cyclocross Day 1

The Cycle-Smart International is one of the marquee New England CX events. I raced the 55+ Masters Men/Open Category 1-4, a deep field of 48 racers. Finished 16th with a time of 41:05 over 5 laps (lap times: 8:36, 8:09, 8:05, 8:13, 8:03 — negative split, getting faster each lap).

I'm not a big fan of the 55+ plus races, too many younger racers. I guess this is how the 60+ field will look like in 5 years. Not a front row start for a change, and based on Stephen Hyde's clinic from the day before picked the left side to start. This worked out great with an upcoming left turn had space to maneuver. During the race I just focussed on the regular 60+ racers in the field. With a relative good start and with my consistent attack on the tarmac straight was soon battling it out with Dave for "first" place in the 60+ field. We were going back and forth, but he had a little left for the last 3 turns and beat me by 10s as I ran out of gas. My usual 2nd lap dip did not happen, perhaps because I took my gel 25 minutes before the race instead of the normal 10 minutes.

https://www.crossresults.com/race/13415#r116643

Shedd Park Cyclocross

Shedd Park is a recurring race on the New England calendar. I raced here many times going back to 2014. I raced the Master Men/Open 60+ category, field of 34 racers. Finished 19th with a time of 52:03 over 7 laps (lap times: 8:04, 8:11, 8:33, 8:54, 9:21, 9:01). Started fast but faded through the middle laps.

Back to a front row start came second through the holeshot, and during the first lap worked my way to first place. Had a nasty slip on one of the off-camber turns but kept everyone behind. Unfortunately the effort costed and started to fade hard after the 2nd lap and almost the whole field passed me. Not a good race.

Turned out that night after I came home I had a fever and was sick for two weeks, that explained this under par performance. Also that slip; it caused my saddle to several bruise my tailbone. Ouch!

Link to results: https://www.crossresults.com/race/13565#r116643

With only 2 races November was a quiet month, with lots of training, unfortunately got sick at the end of month for 2 weeks which turned out not to be a good prep for Nationals in Deceember.