Opie Adventures: OVCX#13/CapCity - John Bryan SP-Ohio State Cross Championships-11/28/2010-Yellow Springs, Ohio

Wow, I go to the Ohio State Cross Championships and actually move down in the finish placings with an 11th place.

Google Earth and my Garmin Tracks

Let's see, Matt Steirwalt beat me, Sherman beat me, James Turner beat me (again). Fancy bike computer said average speed of 10.5 mph and a max speed of 23 mph for the start, pretty lame actually, as I should be doing closer to 30 mph on these types of starts.

My attempt at pulling back a top 10

Men CAT 3 Start Line - I am back a ways

The slick off camber turn...I chose to run

Sister, Mom, Dad

We started further back on the park road than 2009's start by going uphill on the park road to a wide sweeping left hand turn, fading onto the grass into another wide sweeping left turn. We ran around some trees, had a section of turns and log overs, there was a set of double barriers back by the park Gazebo, we had a downhill, an off camber turn that was very slippery during our race (but got tacky for the Elites), we had two sections of muddy/snotty/peanut butter park single-track, that could be easily ridden at high speeds, if those in front of you weren’t on their brakes or riding like little old ladies (some were). There was a false flat back up to the sand pit crossing, that I managed to get out of the saddle and give it my all each lap in order to gain (back) some ground. To explain, in the first lap, someone decided to try to jam their front tire between the left inside rear part of my frame and the spokes of my wheel. This basically stopped me in my tracks and launched me over the bars and onto the ground, smashed my left shin into my pedal and threw my bike away from where I landed. As I flew through the air and landed on the ground, I watched about 20 dudes ride by me. While flying through the air and laying on the ground, all I could think about was this is the State Championships, is this really happening? I got up as fast as I could and used the wreck to fuel my anger put into the pedals for the remainder of the race. I started picking off guys left and right, gaining back lost ground each lap. I was attacking and running the double barriers, bunny hopping the logs, running the off camber slick hill, putting in all out efforts on the short soggy slow false flat before the sand pit. At least in my mind, I was flying as hard and as fast as I could muster. I was happy to have my parents and my sister watch me race, since my dad the Football Coach was there, feeding me placing each lap, which was awesome and very helpful.
I managed to save face and feel pretty good about nearly missing top 10 by one spot. This was the 13th race of the OVCX series, I had two more after this, the Indianapolis double weekend. Then I also plan to do the last Cap City race in the Elite category.