Veterans Cross Report

This years Veterans Cyclocross race was one event that I was actually looking forward to and had on my calendar as a must do event.   Last year Roger said he wanted to bring back racing to the University of Saint Mary campus.  I remember those old races there from the De Stad Cyclocross Van Kansas Series.  Sadly Roger was not able to secure Saint Mary and moved his event across the street to the Leavenworth VA Medical Center.  

Last one?  I have heard this many times from my good friend Roger Harrison.  He says that this will be his last cyclocross race that he ever promotes.  I would not bet money on it.   This year Roger teamed up with Big D Cycling to promote the 2014 Veterans Cyclocross race.  They did a great job together and put on a very fun event. 

Carolynn and I were out taking some photos: 2014 Veterans Cyclocross Photos .  My photos of the Cat 4 was taken after consuming several beers but after reviewing them they actually came out great.  Maybe that is my new secret to great photos.

Prior to the race Roger announced that I had won a special award for the best looking racer with the longest hair.  I can not argue with that award and happily accepted a haircut  and style from Tom and Ann's in Leavenworth, KS.   Also got a free wax job.  It has been a long time since I got a Brazilian.....

Big D Cycling provided the food.  Post race I had one of the brats.  Very tasty if I do say so myself.

It was fun racing with my teammates today.  Doug Stone had a lot on the line with the KBCXR series title.  He got off to a fast start ahead of Rick Moseley.

There was a little crash in the first turn.  During warmups I just new someone would go down and it turned out to my by teammate Damian Almanza along with a few others.  I narrowly avoided the pileup.

I settled into a comfortably hard pace early on.  I wanted to ride strong for the entire 45 minutes and have my last 3 laps my fastest.  This season I have been along side David Romisch several times.  He paced me on the second lap just before the barriers.

I decided to pick up the pace mid race and actually brought back David and passed him.  The effort was short lived and David got back by during the last few laps when I burped my rear tire and had to slow the pace. 

My main goal for the day was to try to place in the top 3 in the 45-49 division.  My second goal was to beat David and Damian.  Both goals were reach  :-)

Roger put a $50.00 bounty on Steve Songer's head.  Any rider who beat him took home some gas money.  Steve worked his way through everyone except overall race winner Moseley. 

Overall I liked the course.  It was a bit fast and very bumpy in sections, but I did well on the tight corners.  Heck I even liked the very narrow course - no one could pass me there :-)  This course would have been great if it was muddy or snowed. 

I was happy to see the finish of the race.  The last 2 or so laps were hard.  I had burped my tire and lost about 10 psi.   The low pressure smoothed out the rough course but the turns were very tricky.  I should have just came in for bike change but the low tire really was not slowing my down much so I rolled on to the finish.

It took an act from Roger Harrison for me to actually win an award.  Roger gave out awards in 5 year age groups for the Masters.  With the competition this is actually a good idea.  An even better idea is to have a Masters A/B class.  The A class for Cat 1/2 masters.  The B class for Cat 3/4 masters.  

Doug Stone had another great event and took home the the series championship. 

Christopher tried to race the Kona single speed in the Men's Cat 4 class.  He got off to a strong start and looked good.  This lasted about 2 laps when he came in for a bike change and grabbed his old flat bar MTB bike that we built up for him.  Still unsure what to do for a bike for him.  He is about 6'1 now and needs a larger frame bike but his lack of training does not motivate me to spend the money on a new bike.  I was hoping that he would "earn" a new bike by putting in an honest effort to train some and not just show up on race day. 

I put my award to good use and consumed about 3 beers.  That is a lot for me but since Roger got Bud Light just for me and I was lucky enough to win an mug I just had to.