CX06 #5, Anoka
C race, 5/43 overall, 3rd C1 (!) Best CX finish ever.
After a cold spell, it warmed up nicely today, just in time for a perfect race day. Despite an early start, we managed to lose enough time changing and waiting on the portapotty to miss pre-riding the course.
As it turned out, the course was mostly flat, some singletrack but nothing too technical. Two places had loose sand, one was about a 50-foot sandpit after a barrier, for a short run. Overall, a flat open course with good stretches for recovery and speed - 24.6mph max today. This was more one for the roadies.
I started toward the front, and after the first 1/4 lap was at the tail end of the lead group, around 12th. This let me get a good look at the course ahead, and i was feeling pretty strong off the start. I had a pretty solid next couple of laps, passing a couple of people on each lap and keeping a pretty steady pace. By lap 4, i found myself mostly alone, about 150 yards behind the small lead group and maybe 60 yards ahead of the next pack behind me. I hit it hard the last 1.5 laps and was able to catch the very end of the lead group at the finish line, just passing an unfortuate guy who lost a seat during the race.
Malte had a strong start, and was running 2nd when he suffered a broken chain on the first lap at the short & rideable runup. The chain was only about 4 months old, but he apparently went in to it with too big a gear. When the chain broke he went down and got a bad scrape on the back of his knee. He ran the rest of the lap and the pit support put it back together for him, so he finished riding, but a lap down. Probably 2nd or 3rd in his group.
(Update: Malte went to the Northfield CX race the next day and finished 2nd!)