Divide and conquer. That's my strategy for dealing with this winter. Ten days in Socal after Thanksgiving, and then Bend landed me at home just in time for the holidays. That kept my mind off the cold for a bit, but then in the darkest days of early January, a week straight of daily highs in the teens took their toll. A quick check of accuweather for 93010 showed lots of smiling suns and 60s and 70s. While I have a very low pain threshold when it comes to airline travel, my last several trips have gone unusually smooth. It may only take one flight from hell to trigger the "never again" response, but a bike planted out there already, a cheap ticket, a cross race, and a long weekend sealed the deal this time.
Besides that, I wanted to be sure to get in some running to prepare for Derry this weekend. So Thursday started off with a 9 mile out and back run on the Ventura/Ojai bike path. In shorts and a tank top. It was around 75. Then I picked up the bike, rode for an hour and a half on the flats to Point Mugu, then went to get a massage. Authentic Mexican and a few Bohemias for dinner. Friday another road ride. I have a set of wheels with 700x38 Specialized Nimbus road tires on them out there. The ride is plush but they roll decent enough. I didn't want to get too carried away, so I drove up to Newbury Park and well, parked. My route led over the little climb and across Hidden Valley/Lake Sherwood, then climbed Westlake Boulevard. My 38x27 low gear combined with the "January Effect" on my waistline made this harder than it should have been. From there I dive-bombed Muholland all the way to the coast, refilling the bottles with water at Leo Carillo Beach before heading back the way I came. My goal was to make it all the way up Muholland without using the 27, and staying seated as much as possible. This climb is not too severe, ascending around 1600 feet in 7.5 miles for an average grade of around 4%. It does dip down in a few spots though, and the last two miles is somewhat steeper. This little soire gave me 36 minutes at threshold, almost all in the 24 and seated. Perfect. Now I get to descend Westlake. Sorry, but I really wish I had a helmet cam for this one. This is my favorite descent.
Total for the day was just over 3 hours and around 4500 feet of climbing.
Saturday another run, only about six miles this time. Then we rode an out and back from Camarillo down the PCH to Neptune's Net. Sunday was race day after all. And I was already tired. Luckily the winter series races do not start early in the morning, and the venue was on the northern edge of LA, right over in the valley, less than an hour away by car. I raced the combined 35+, 45+, 55+ wave. We all started together, competing for the same prizes, but had separate number series and the races were scored by age group for the purposes of the 3-race Cross Fever series points. Confused? Good.
The course was in a park under the shadow of the gigantic Hansen Dam. I never did go up top, so honestly I have no idea of how big the lake on the other side is, or if it even had any water in it. The park was mostly grass, but very, very bumpy, and the course featured three sections of pavement as well. Laps were not very long, under six minutes for us. During warmup, I really felt like shit. Having not raced since Bend (which lasted all of 14 minutes for me), and with sparse outdoor riding since then, my adventures of the past three days had me tired out. So before our start I followed my Socal tradition of finishing my warmup by doing burpees and pushups next to the staging area. It helps if your competition believes you're some kind of nut...
I lined up second row. There were thirty starters total. Even in the land of hot rods and sunshine, the January CX thing is an iffy proposition. I took note of the three series leaders in the front row, particularly the 45+ guy. But I lined up behind some other dude. On the whistle, he didn't move. Seriously, this guy lined up front row and then rolled off like he didn't have a care in the world. You can see in the picture how this affected my start. No matter, as with the 35+ in there, some of these guys were damn fast. The start pavement was pretty long too, so I did snag a spot or two before the first little dirt chicane, which quickly led to the steep rideup in the first picture. Everyone said this would be a cluster if you weren't up front. The preferred line was on the left, but I'd wisely tested the right too, and chose this for the first lap. Good move. Two or three riders tangled and fell into the left line at the crest, with me being one of the last to sneak by cleanly on the right.
After that it did not take long for 45+ series leader Robert DeFerrante (PAA/ReMax) to come by. I jumped on his wheel and settled in. Like I said earlier, the grass sections of the course were super bumpy. Brent Prenzlow, the winner of both the 35+ and Elite races, chose a suspended mountain bike. This is not that unusual in Socal, as many of the competitors are sponsored mountain bike pros to begin with. But in this case he may have even felt it faster, or at least more comfortable for doing the double. One other MTB-mounted guy passed us too, but for the most part Robert and I locked into a stalemate. We each threw in a few digs, but there was no shaking him, and I was able to stay in contact when he led as well. Eventually we swept up another guy who wore a 35+ number. After two laps the cards still said 5 laps to go... Ouch.
I alternated between trying to put on pressure, and just sitting on. The three little climbs on the course were my friends, but Robert was always able to close back up on me in some of the bumpy turns. I was riding Griffos at around 30-32 psi but was right on the edge, losing grip and sliding a few times each lap. One of my digs got rid of the third guy, but every time I looked back DeFerrante was still right there. On the last lap I had him behind me, so I went a bit slower, figuring what the hell, he's faster than me on these sections so the slower I go the better. But I wasn't thinking far enough ahead, and he jumped me on a long off-camber straightaway. He chopped me a little bit as he cut back onto the preferred line, smacking my front wheel with his rear tire. The off camber led into a very loose, sketchy 180 onto pavement that had given me trouble. He sprinted away, and I did not really get on for a draft, but this part was tailwind anyway. I knew I could close up on the fast downhill leading toward the barriers, as Paul had advised me to ride a huge gear there as it was smoother than the rest of the course. I'd planned to attack from the front there, but so much for that. As it was, I got right on my rival's wheel going into the barriers, which required a pre-shift to your smallest gear and a very quick remount in order to get up the following hill smoothly. But of course I botched the clip in a bit.
I still managed to keep it close on the subsequent downhill, but the last corner onto the pavement was very tricky and a good place to end the season with a nasty slideout if you got too reckless, which I'm not. And honestly, I think DeFerrante was just plain faster than me. I did not give up but he pulled out several bike lengths and I did not close it, ending up 8th overall, 2nd 45+. It felt really good to race again though. In. The. Warm. So now it was finally over. The cross season that is. I did a long cooldown while snapping some pictures of Robin and the rest of the competitors in the womens' race. Then it started to rain! They said this was the first rain at a Socal CX race in 7 years. The elites even had muddy bikes at the end of their race.
Monday morning was a monsoon, but by the afternoon it blew out of there and I got in a beautiful sunset cruise across the plain again. Tuesday morning was OK too, so I ran an 11 miler with some hills before it started pouring again. Then that blew out too, but by then I thought it better to get packed up rather than try to sneak in another ride. Caught the red-eye home, once again rather painless. And now the days are longer, the skies brighter, the nights a bit warmer. Only six more weeks of winter? They are just making this too easy for me... Thanks for reading.
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