This past weekend I decided to change states and go race in one of Tennessee's cyclocross races. This was a new series: Beat the Freak, sponsored by SVMIC cycling. In a follow-up post, I'm going to compare the TN and the GA series of races, so I'll leave out any opinionizing about the course/series until then.
The Course
This course was a very, very simple course compared to my previous race. Whereas the last course was more technical and had 3 mandatory dismounts (2 sets of 2 barriers, and 1 flight of stairs) and one mostly-mandatory dismount (log -> hill -> sand -> hill), this course had only 1 mandatory dismount (1 set of 1 barrier) and no mostly-mandatory dismounts (unless...
Earlier this fall, while browsing the Internets, I ran across something I had never heard of before - a sport called cyclocross. If you want a quick overview of the sport, I have two videos for you.
The first is a highlights reel - three minutes of some of the more extreme moments of cyclocross races.
This second video is a summary of a race held last month called "Cross Vegas". It's 5 minutes long but gives a better feel of what, in general, a race is like (this is the cyclocross race that Lance Armstrong actually raced in this year). Public safety notice: Two naughty words used in the final interview of this...
This weekend I competed in a local triathlon in my hometown. The race slogan is "To Finish Is to Win", which turned out to be very fitting. My sole goal for this race was to finish. When I first started considering this race a few months ago, I had loftier, specific goals and times I wanted to meet - yet as the race got closer I realized those were not safely achievable (as in, I would have to overtrain and hurt myself). Taking the advice of others, I modified my gameplan and just concentrated on having fun, and finishing, which I did!
This race was unique in that it was a reverse (slightly short) sprint. 5K run followed by a 6 mile (very flat) bike...
