The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

(Let the racing begin! Taking off in the second row to the right of the field)

Ah yes, the UCI3 Cinci weekend of racing has come and gone in a blur of excitement... or dust and heat that is. Anyone who decides to tackle this 3 day race event knows it's a tough 3 days and I was super excited to test my cross skills against a full pro women's field that seems to be growing more and more every year for this event. Sweet!

My teammates Anne Young, and Josh Johnson packed up the RV (Mr T.) and took off for the first venue on Thur night. After a uneventful trip down, we spent a little too much time going around and up and down with the RV in Devou Park to find a place to stay only to be moved by the parks department early on race day. Partial RV purpose day 1 failed.

The Good: Anyway, once we finally got settled we headed to check out the newly designed venue this year. It only took a quick glance for me to know that this was not going to be on my "like" list of cross races. This was confirmed with my pre-ride. I make no secrets that I dislike hills and this place was crawling with them! Add some massive pot holes, heat, dust (asthma), and loose untacky dirt and I seriously considered bowing out on the day of racing to save my legs for the days to come... but I'm not a quitter, and maybe I would surprise myself. All in all, I ended up 16th. Which is funny, because it happened to be my best place of the weekend. I didn't feel good, I actually felt discouraged after this race as I discovered I still have a long way to go on my cornering skills. In retrospect, this isn't a complete handicap, as I know I can work on this in the future. The race itself was pretty uneventful and since I wasn't really in the mood to race, it all seemed kinda like a foggy memory while it was happening. Day 1 done.

(Taking on the barriers. Thanks for the great pics Jeff! http://jjakucyk.exposuremanager.com)

The Bad: We packed up and moved on to the day 2 venue at Sunset park. I think everyone loves this place. I really happen to like it too and since everyone else does, I knew most of the field had the same thought in their minds: " I'm gonna kill it on day 2." I like the course here, but also love the venue itself. Lion heart's, Doug gave us a friendly greeting on arrival that night and the place also has hot showers available, plus it has a great set-up for racing and spectating. I actually felt pretty good on my warm-up and was fired up to get going. We had several more gals out there and I actually had a good spot going into the first turn for a change. Excellent. Until everyone decided to go around a tree in the same line and as the pile formed, I had to put my foot down and dismount. Wha, wha, wha... stuck in catch up mode. That's cross racing though. I did a pretty good job of chasing back, but once the tight twisty came, I started losing time again. I eventually faded to 20th. Not near what I hoped for, and I was really down after the race. It's hard to be down for long when there are so many encouraging people out there, and I was thankful for every person out there with the kind words. I do have to remember a few things and keep those in perspective: 1. what I do for a real living is pretty much way different from those who beat me and bike racing isn't my job, 2. I've had a few major physical setbacks recently, and 3. I'm still a doing pretty darn good in a highly competitive field. I tried to remember these things and get my confidence out of the gutter.

I gained a huge insight on a couple things after this race too. One of which came from a personal professional pep talk, and the other is that I have been running a retarded gear choice up to this point. This may seem minor to all of you- but it's a huge revelation to me! That said, I was really excited to get to day 3!

(One of the many corners at Java Johnny's)

The Ugly: Harbin Park is typically been on my least favorite list. It's wide open, has some gradient climbs and not really what I would think would suite me. After getting my gearing changed, however, I was looking forward to it. We woke up that morning, well, it took some time to actually wake up, and already felt the heat starting to build. After 2 brutal days of racing in the heat, I think we were all dreading racing in more heat and looked forward to getting our racing done and moving on with the day. The bus was pretty sedate that morning as we were all pretty much in zombie mode and starting to feel the effects of the days before. Regardless, we had some racing to do. I decided to limit my time on the course since it was pretty straight forward. I only did 2 recon laps and chose to stay by the fans and water at the rv on the hottest of the 3 days. My plan worked out pretty well as I was feeling surprising good in my warm up.

(Always my favorite part of cyclocross: barriers! )

At the gun I had a decent start, nothing great, but the legs felt good and I knew I could do well as the race went on. Once we got off the pavement gals started getting twitchy already and I knew that everyone was going to be crazy the whole race with this being a C1 graded race. I kept a pretty smart race at the beginning and was pleased with how some of my mental visualization had improved my corning skills so far. About midway in the race I found myself in a nice group with the exception of one reckless gals who felt she needed to chop pass in order to gain time. Apparently, this caused Anne Swartz to be unnecessarily taken out and left me wanting to get away from her as quickly as I could. I went to the front and gaped her for a while, only to find her back on my six going into some off chamber technical spots at the beginning of lap 2. Apparently, she couldn't wait the 3 extra seconds to get around me on the flats so she decided to take an outside line, cut in front of me, lose her traction and slide out right under my front wheel. That really worked out well for her! I think we all know how this goes from here... I run her over, endo over my bars, bounce down the incline for several yards at a high rate of speed, finally come to a stop only to then find myself in motion again as my left foot gets tangled in another riders bike and I get dragged several more feet before she stops to let me out. All I have to say it thank goodness I was tangled in Gerry S's bike and she took the time to let me out, or my foot would have been cracked for sure! I don't think some other gals would have been so nice. In those seconds I was being dragged like a cowboy stuck on a bucking bronco, I was kinda laughing that this just had to be happening to my reconstructed ankle... really? Finally the never ending crash came to a stop. Hello! Where am I? And is it possible my entire body is broken because it sure felt like it. I was none to happy to say the least, but I tried to keep my cool and found my bike and thought if I got going again I would shake off the horrible feeling of blunt trauma. So after getting my chain put back on, I took a few pedals and thought I should stop and take a look at my foot since it hurt really bad (I hurt everywhere really bad) and take a better assessment. Okay, I just need to get going as the entire field is long gone. After riding for several minutes I decided something was wrong, I didn't know what, so I easy spun and started doing an anesthesia assessment on the go.... collarbone- seems okay, right wrist- not cool, couldn't feel my fingers (I ended up bruising my carpel tunnel), reconstructed ankle- sore, but workable, right and left back of shoulder- grass rash and bruises, left toe and inside of foot- wasn't sure (ended up with a huge bruise here), left hip- grass rash and big hematoma, right arm- some sort of puncture wound, right knee- cuts and bruises, right shoulder- bruising, lungs- just the wind knocked out of me... nothing seemed major, I just felt stunned. Or so I thought. Anyway, I decided to drop out at the end of the second lap. I was having trouble breathing and couldn't hold the handlebars. I was bummed, I had felt so good. Doesn't that always figure? Great legs and something beyond your control messes it up. Oh well. Done deal.

On the way home I had a few hours to replay things while driving the rv. My mates were resting their wounds as Anne decided to crack her head and get a concussion on her warm-up and Josh wrecked and flatted out of the race too. I took a look back over my 18 years of racing and came to the conclusion that this was the first race I had ever dnf'ed because of a body mechanical. Ever. I felt like a wimp, maybe I should have finished. What was my problem, nothing was bleeding bad or any bones sticking out.

Well, after a couple days at home, I still felt like a train wreck. I was in the ER staring a IV on a pediatric patient for work and asked the ER doc to take a look at my side that had been killing me. Case closed. I had broke my ribs in that massive pile drive into the hard ground. No wander I felt like my lungs had been dislocated. That's what was wrong. Even though I didn't feel so much like a wimp for the dnf, the last few days really has me tip toeing through the days. I'm getting really tired of being in pain and having bad body luck. I pray it changes for me soon, I would really like to see what I can do at a race 100%. Who knows? I'm sure God has this all planned out, but I hope the gal in question learns that racing a bike is NOT worth riding dirty and injuring other people around you. That's just ugly.

Anyway, the long weekend was fun, and I enjoyed the races and time with my teammates. It was so cool have the local fans out there cheering me on, and that always makes you go a little faster. I wish I could have produced a little better results for everyone, but in the end, I'm proud of what I accomplished. Thanks for reading and cheering everyone! Until next time- HUP, HUP!

(Making it cleanly through the sand pit before we both got wrecked!)

“For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”- Jeremiah 29:11