Carpentersville 2008

Connor! great game face! This picture is from a great blog that has many many pictures of the Chicago Cup races. Carolyn is the gal's name and her pictures are soooo good. I especially ((no seriously) recommend looking up the cat 4 women fighting it out in the sand. I smiled at these.
CLASSIC. http://velosnaps.wordpress.com/

WHAT A RACE!!

THERE were balloon bouncy moon walks, an inflatable climbing wall for the kids. ..... and .........a DRUM CORP practicing by the sand. :) THat was super motivational! ((okok that was not the actual drum corp pictured. haha.))

REBECCA MUCH won the Carpentersville Cross race. She must be made of rockets. Speaking of rockets, Debby Dust got second and was doing pretty good at closing the gap for a while on Rebecca. Ok.... Now imagine an old rocket that is sputtering a bit at the start then lets loose a crack and a stutter and a pop (my knees) ...and then a wheeze or two before it gots itself its motor spewing along...... Ok that be me. I did pre-ride and I did warm up. I was right next to a the start but that was the last I saw of Rebecca.

The course was so well done. The organizers used every hill to an advantage and I really enjoyed the new course. It started immediately with some tight corners leading us up and down then back up an incline. Rebecca had made a sizeable gap by the second incline and for a while she was 'just in reach'. I already knew from the other race what kind of fast short-burst of power she has and I could see if I didn't get around these other girls faster then I'll be playing catch up with everyone else. Heck, I had to turn myself inside out to pass one of them. I am sure everyone else had the same idea I did! But..I didn't panic at the riders getting away and just focused on the next turn and was hoping that I could pick off one. then another. I powered up the incline so hard that I finally passed a stubborn racer. I almost caught up with Debby's wheel. I didn't jump over the ditch very well and lost more distance remounting too slowly. I still had gals breathing down my neck at this point and I really had to ramp it up thru the trees to try to close the gap.
Holly was in front of Debby now and I was doing all I could to make some headway. The hardest part for me was still coming up. The sand pit.

I 'lept' off my bike into the sand and ran it. I decided to push my bike but the last part of that pit really drug on my bike a bit. Perhaps shouldering my bike would have been better. Here is lombardo's son from last year. I need to get some more current pics because 'the kid' has GROWN a bit since this picture was taken!. I just put this in today for drama and effect. It was actually a bit warmer out and we didn't really need knee warmers.

HEY..there was a DRUM CORP playing by the sand pit!!! It was great to be hitting the sand with the drums sounding out a tempo! SUPER cool. Debby is really good at the sand. In fact if they ever did a National Time Trial race event on miles of sand, she'd probably win. I think she must surely be training along Lake Michigan's Northstreet beach. Good sand there and (( guys dressed in jammers playing volley ball helps a bit too! )) . Holly was in front of her till the sand pit and that is where, I think, Debby got in front of her. At least I think so but I was too far back to see .....huffing along. I ran the sand. I did my double barricade -run up pretty well and much better than last year. I still need to work on my timing and speed and keeping my HANDS OFF THE BRAKES for crying out loud. The run up came after a long fast section with a swoooopy corner on the hill that I just loved. I got so much speed up that I enjoyed being a bit wreckless taking the corner as fast as I could, leaning way into it . FUN! I tell you what, I could do THAT all day long. :)

Now, I was trying to reel Holly in and it was the start of the second lap. Lap two. Every time there was a slightest bit of incline I"d hammer as hard as I could and even get out of my saddle. I was hoping by doing this I'd eventually reel in just...just...yeah....just EVERYONE!!!..((mind over matter)) ....... even Devon who had a 3 minute lead!! (((For those of you confused, Devon Haskell did the men's cat 3 race which started out 3 minutes ahead of our race.)) But it is not a bad thing to think this way. CONFIDENCE is key . FOCUS. Picturing myself doing these things is half the battle. I was trying to get closer, trying to reel in the next rider. It was going to take a while. Maybe a lap, maybe three. ..maybe 3 hours ...yeah . I could catch them all in 3 hours. They will surely need a pee break by then. :)

Then something happened. Holly had to stop and get off her bike. From what I could see when I passed her, it was something wrong with her chain (?) . Ugh . .... I think possibly the sand got in her chain. focus. She was just calm as a cucumber though and fixed what was wrong and got back on her bike super fast. Now I had a challenge in front and behind me to watch out for. ZIKES!

The race ended up with Rebecca, then Debby then me and Holly soon after me then the wild assortment of riders battling out behind us and I have to look and see who all did what.

HEY..... THe venue was great complete with a beer garden. There was even a rock band. (( Unfortunately there was no 'pass thru' of the course thru the beer garden which really bummed out some of us. :( something to do with legal rights and permits. ))) haha.

I want to shout a hello to Clark, Tom , Henry and everyone else who all came out to watch us race. Thanks for the cheers! I LOVED the weather! the band! the wow. perfect fall day, not to hot, not to cool. NICE!

I am so glad to be part of the cross scene. Verdigris is a great team of guys and gals Especially since they are very very good at Cross and we are all doing well in our events.

Like I said, cross is fuN!