Spooky Cross 2008

Tony Nichols and JJ Bailey teamed up again this year for another edition of Spooky Cross. The venue was changed this year to Living History Farms, and word on the street was that this would be a great event.

I’ve never done a ‘cross race, nor had I ever seen one in person. I had hoped to attend the Zoom Performance ‘Cross Practice on the Thursday night before the event, but rain forced its cancellation. So, I was left wondering if I could (or should) try to do one of the races on the weekend.

Saturday morning, Cam went to the park early to help Tony and JJ set up for the event. I decided not to participate, so I went for a little run to get some exercise in for the day. It was another gorgeous fall day! Around 11am, I gathered up our bikes and shoes and headed to the park. Watching the race would be a little easier with the bikes as we could hit more parts of the course to watch.

I took a look at the course with Cam, and then decided maybe I should try the beginner race. Jeff and Craig were going to do it, too, so I thought, “What the heck?” and signed up. It was 30 minutes plus two laps. ‘Cross is pure pain for the entire time you are out there! It was good to have a relatively short race to cut my teeth on, but I was still glad when it was over! I ended up being the first female finisher!

Cam held strong on his stance not to race, so we heckled at the top of the hill with the rest of the crazy spectators. Um, the beer was also very good. What did we do before we could get Fat Tire in Iowa??? By the end of the long day, I had run, raced, and drank some beer, basically all on a nearly empty stomach. I made a complete pig of myself that night!

Sunday was a different story. High winds were predicted and accurately so! The sun was shining and the temps weren’t too bad, but that wind would about blow you over and right through you! Cam was again adamant about not racing, and I wasn’t thinking that racing again in that crazy wind would be a good idea either, so we left both bikes at home in the garage. We arrived at LHF and immediately left to go run some copies for JJ. As we were driving away, we decided to at least grab the bikes at home, just in case… Long story short, we both ended up racing on Sunday.

Sunday’s course was a little longer; not really that much harder, but the wind would play a significant role. I recall being completely blown off a little mulch pile we were to ride over, and being blown to a complete standstill during a decent I was pedaling vigorously down! I finished 6th, one spot out of the money. While Sunday’s race was also quite painful, I came to the conclusion that Saturday was a higher intensity race, and thus was voted the harder of the two days.

I really enjoyed the whole cyclocross experience. The racing is very, very painful, but still pretty fun, kinda like mountain biking. It’s also pretty fun to watch – the laps make it easy to see lots of the action. And, who can argue with drinking beer, watching bike racing, and enjoying some great fall weather?