Cross on the Rock News #3 for 2011 — The Heat was on at Coal Cross

Cross on the Rock News #3 for 2011

Well….it was great to be back cross racing on Vancouver Island. I hear about it all the time…..there is just a great “vibe” at our events here. Solid and hard racing but people get along and without “attitude”….everyone can talk to everyone….and then try to beat them to the finish line. You guys make it the way it should be…..lets keep it that way!

Building on the foundation laid down by Dave Nowack and U-Rock at the Hostel-Course (Still our longest Expert race EVER) and then the Number 6 Mine park in Cumberland, the last 2 years at Village Park have been a huge success. In it’s second year at our 3rd Comox Valley location we enjoyed a HUGE turn out, incredibly HOT weather, great racing and a great course.

A huge THANKS to our race director Lisa Ludwig for bang-on race organization. We also heard nothing but good things about the course that Lisa’s Husband Curtis designed. Last year’s event was great….this year’s event was a bit greater! I told Curtis that the test of a good race course is one that the designers feels compelled to race it….’cause they want to see how it feels in a real situation. Well the course must have been good as Curtis used his cross bike for its intended use for the first time….I think her narrowly missed the beer prime and almost won the t-shirt for barrier bunny hop performance.

As always thanks to our series sponsors.

A Special Thanks to:

• To The Village of Cumberland and Coal Hills BMX Club for allowing us to use this venue.
• Our host Cycling Club; Trail Bicycles-Eatmore Sprouts Cycling Team
• Our Local Bike Shop Sponsor; Trail Bicycles and Jeff Beeston
• All our volunteers, marshals and post pounders

We have kind of given up on the traditional “Race Report” last year. Who lead who. Times. Splits…..it is never as exciting as being there in the race or being there live watching the action. The results give the stats. Everything else….well you gotta be there.

We do try to give a summary of the race though and things that caught our eye or that deserve attention. More like an “Event Report” We hope you find that more entertaining and valuable.

Results

Normally not worth a specific mention but between Katie, Roland and Hillary Grant the results were not only posted on our web site the fastest they have ever been but for the first time ever (outside of 2006 National Championships) the race had the results posted at the site. If you knew how hard it is to read the language that are our timing sheets and try to make sure it is as accurate as possible…you would know that this is a HUGE accomplishment and only achieved through the perseverance of Roland and Katie.

HOT-HOT-HOT

32 degrees C when I left the venue at 5:30………whoah!

Impressed

• Jordan Duncan. 16 Years old. Started racing our races at 13 years old. Now racing Expert and finishing mid pack…..Wendy impressed too!
• Rob Britton. Started racing our races even before we were C.O.T.R. was our yesterday racing to a 4th…..made the long list for the Canadian Team to road world champs. The only racer on the list that did not race in Europe this year.
• Guy Ridler…..an amazing first half of the Expert Race…. ….way to hang in there!
• Kelly Guest. Top Xterra racer at Cyclocross!
• The return of Monica Birch
• The number of kids out for our kids race!!

Post event notes.

• I hope that no one was disappointed with shorter races yesterday. Most people looked nothing less that relieved when I told them their races were done. With the length of the course one more lap would have made the leaders slightly over the normal time range but the back of the packers would have been a long way over. We thought given the conditions it would be best to go shorter. The Expert race was the shortest one we have ever run but I can tell you after I stopped sweating 20 minutes into the race I don’t personally think I could have done another lap…..I was cooked.
• I was very happy to see Carter Hovey back at our event. The last time Carter did one of our races was 2005 at the first ever BC cup race we hosted at Diver Lake Park. You see….I have never told anyone this….but I have a secret admiration for Carter. Back in the 90’s he was traveling down to Seattle from Victoria to participate in the Super Cup and Super Prestige races down there. I would hear stories (per blog/web/twitter/facebook) from people about the conditions and races. I had never done a cyclocross race but I was fascinated by it…..so Carter was my first Cyclocross hero. Thus having Carter race our series again was like watching your Hero race…..plus he won!!
• Having the Coal Hills BMX track concession open was great. Not your usual concession stand fair with their “Power Burger”….fresh produce and a tasty fresh locally made bun…..it was really good!
• There are a lot of riders that come out to the races that I genuinely admire. I think the ones that I gain the most admiration for are the ones that never give up. The ones that don’t quit. I saw a couple of great examples of this yesterday. One was Justin Mark who had done the Grand Fondo the day before. His pedal stripped out of his crank arm. So he thread it in on the back side to clean up the threads and put the pedal back on and kept going. Then he got a flat……and got a wheel from his wife in the pits and kept going. Then another flat…which he rode to the finish. Thomas Skinner who was in around 6th on the last lap when he wrapped his rear DR into his spokes on the far side of the track. He ran probably 2k or so to the finish and lost about 14 spots….but still finished. Craig Ritchey who had a problem with his bike and fell back into the low teens before climbing all the way back to 3rd place. Jamie Emery and Arron Desseault who’s days were done early with mechanicals but still jumped back in and raced even with impending “NOR”. Andrew Brown who went into the pits, rode through the pits to his car to fix his bike…back into the pits and onto the course to finish. All these guys did not quit and were racing……to race…..and to finish. I really dig that!
• Numbers……we had a mock Jersey with the number exactly the way we wanted it….and some people still did not get it right…..if you knew how hard it was to do timing you would know how important it is for us to have those numbers on your jersey correctly…..Roland says we should give one warning and then you lose your call up for the next race!! Beginners of course are exempt!!
• Powsey…step out from behind the mike and swing your leg over the top tube in Port Alberni!
• Bummed…..both Billy McMillan and Kristen Magnesson did not get to race and were at the hospital instead. Billy is one of the highest on the stats under “the faithful” and K-mag was looking forward to her first time on her cross bike this year….bummer but no breaks so that is good.

PHOTO CONTEST

It is always nice to see some photographers out there. Don’t forget we are having a contest this year and we also have galleries on our web site. Fire your top shots to: photos@23.235.211.7/~thehol19/crossontherock/

Here are some galleries from the weekend:

http://niglb.smugmug.com/CrossOntheRock2011/

RACE RULE CLAIRIFIATION

Our number 1 priority as a series is to have fun, competitive races. We don’t like “attitude” at our events….we just want everyone to have some hard racing….but basically be able to share a parking lot pop afterwards with someone you just out sprinted for 10th place. In our opinion in order to have fun races everyone has to be on a level playing field….that means some rules. One rule that we have explained before but we should probably include in all the race bibles is with regard to pits and outside assistance. As it stands the rule is this. If you have a mechanical or problem on the course…such as a flat you proceed the direction of the course to the pits to receive help….change of wheel etc. You can not cut the course to the pits as that would not be completing the distance. Nor can you go backwards on the course to the pits if you have passed the entrance. If you cut the course or receive outside assistance outside the pit than we will rank you with a NOR which means Not Officially Ranked. You are fee to continue in the race but you will not be in contention for prizes or points at that race. We also expect that if you cut the course etc.or receive outside assistance and we don’t see you then you would let the timers know after the race to rank you NOR. Fair is fun….fun is better.

2011 CATEGORIES UPDATED POST RACE WITH COMMENTS

All the categories were competitive. I would say that a couple of people may wish to look at their lap/race times and either move up or move down a category to be more competitive/happy racing.

WOMENS: The women are stepping it up and am PUMPED. We had 28 women racing at Coal Cross. 7 in Beginners. 10 in Intermediate and 11 in Open Women. Don’t rest though…we still need to recruit, drag, coerce more girls into coming out ‘cause you never know who might have a wedding or other function to go to……and we don’t want the numbers to dip under 10 per category!! Take a look at the list of racers under statistics on our web site…..see if there are any names of any girls that you know but are not coming out…..drag them out!

MENS INTERMEDIATE and MASTERS: There was a bit of confusion around who should race masters and who should race intermediate. We had a few masters in intermediate….which we let slide for this time as people had made plans…family waiting etc. Basically it is this. We have an ability based category system for the race series. The “B” category is split into 2. Under 40 which we call “Intermediate” and over 40 which we call “Masters”. If you are under 39 you race either Intermediate or Expert. If you are over 40 you race ether Masters or Expert. The only difference between Masters and Intermediate is that Masters usually do one more lap to be consistent with the length of racing they would do if they raced a USGP or other bigger race….usually around 45 to 50 minutes.

If there is any confusion around this please fire me an e-mail.

SINGLE SPEEDERS: Hmmmmmm……..Single Speeders……where were you? Get your ASS out there or we will go back to giving all your beer out to the geared riders……enough said.

KIDS: We had a GREAT turn out for our kids race. I LOVE it as it is more of a family type event and I look forward to getting Tycho out there next year. I would like some feedback though from the parents as to what they think a reasonable distance for the kids races are as well as if it should be an actual “race” rather than just a “ride”…..? Yes I know all your 3-10 year olds are super human athletes and should be racing Expert if we would let them…….!!! OK be reasonable and fire me your thoughts as I would love to hear them.

SERIES SCHEDULE

• September 11th. Village Park in Cumberland: In the BOOKS!
• October 2nd. McLean’s Mill in Port Alberni
• October 10th. Topaz Park in Victoria
• October 15th. Beban Park in Nanaimo (Island Championships)
• Social at the new Oak Bay Bikes in Nanaimo in the PM.
• October 16th. Bowen Park in Nanaimo
• October 30th. Transfer Beach in Ladysmith
• November 20th TBA Park in Victoria (Series Championships and Double Points)

NEXT RACE PORT ALBERNI in just under 3 Weeks!!

SERIES SPONSORS

• KONA
• Oak Bay Bikes Nanaimo
• Lambert: Pedros-Leyzne
• Action Motorcycles
• PHILLIPS BEER
• Howard Johnson
• Saltspring Coffee
• Oakley
• Pro Bar
• Aviawest
• Frontrunners

Brought to you by the Council of Cross.
23.235.211.7/~thehol19/crossontherock/

This Cyclocross Series is Organized by the Cross Council:

With the following cycling clubs: MIVA, VICC, Everti Cycling Club, UROC, Arrowsmith MTB Club, ASS, Alberni Valley Riders and IRC

Supported by:
OBB Victoria, Westshore and Nanaimo
Trail Bikes in Courtenay
Experience cycles in Duncan

Frontrunners in Nanaimo

Straight Up Cycles in Victoria

Dodge City Cycles in Cumberland

Ozzie’s Cycles in Port Alberni

Sanctioned by:

Cycling BC