Richmond Festival of Cross

This past weekend was my first weekend of racing in over 2 years and it was awesome. My goal for the weekend was to have fun and not get caught up in the emotion and pressure of feeling like I have to do well to have fun. Saturday's race was at Chimborozo park and had a lot of elevation change with a set of stairs that left me exhausted. The race went well for my first cross race and I kept my pace and raced my own race battling for three of the four laps with a guy who got the best of me on the last lap.

Photos from Saturdays races at Chimborazo Park Mens Collegiate C

Get the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer

Get the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer

Sunday's race was at Bryan park and resembled a crit more than a cross race with more than half of the race on pavement and the rest on fast hard pack. I felt much better on Sunday knowing what to expect for the race as well as my energy level and fitness. I managed to stay with a quick group for most of the race and with about half of the last lap left decided to sit in and let someone else attack, and a huge attack was put in with little response from my group and quickly swallowed back up before entering the single track portion of the lap. Entering the last set of barriers I was third in the field of 7 and came out in front of everyone after some pushing and shoving and rode slow through the technical section before hammering it for the last little bit leaving the group I was with and crossing the line without anyone from the group. Sunday was a lot of fun and left me excited for the rest of the season. Overall I took 5th both days for mens collegiate C out of 8 and 7 respectively. Overall in my races I place 19th of 30some and 20 of 43.