OVCX - John Bryan SP - Cyclocross Race - October 2, 2011

Lining up with 60 plus guys is always better than lining up with 120. However the challenges remain, lots of pedals, shifters, elbows, gritting of teeth, tongues hanging out, grunts, shifting noises and swear words. However, the difference is the 35 and 45 plus categories have a tendency to be very competitive. Many entrants, who train hard, who set goals each season to improve their fitness, watts, overall speed on a given course and improve their results to a new place among the masses each week, each season. Sounds easy right?

Well, it’s not that easy if everyone you are racing against has been putting in more hours, more time, more training, maybe some of them have a coach? Maybe some of them are a few years younger? Maybe some of them have a job, where they can get out in the Fall as the days shorten earlier than you? Maybe they lost their job and have been able to go out and spend lots of time on the bike? Maybe they just might have the gift, a better watt output at a given 20 minute effort? Maybe they have a higher VO2 max and can sustain 45 minutes at a breakneck speed longer than you? Some people you race with each week, talk post race each week with ‘excuses’. I discount these, we all have them. I believe it’s more so about all the above questions and differences between us as bike riders and athletes.

With that, I got registered, grabbed my free awesome giant cowbell provided by the main race sponsor, got my helmet set up for the race chip system, that would track our lap times as well as our finish time and filled out my free raffle ticket for the Reynolds Carbon wheelset.

I headed back to the car to pin up my number, usually the BWE takes care of this as part of my good luck process, however, she was on a social and cowbell marketing mission. Crap I forgot pins. Ahh found some spares in the hatch of the car.

Number pin’d, it’s time for some pre-race drink and some warm up on the bike. The last race was finished so I sneak out onto the course looking for places I can excel, places that suit my skills, areas and corners I can handle faster than others.

The course is long, I mean long, did I say long? I like a long course, but I also like to travel to cross races for the full 45 minutes of racing. I don’t like being short changed by 5 minutes either. Am I bitching? Maybe, but I traveled to your race, paid your entry fee and I want my 45 minutes, not 40, not 42, Forty Fucking Five Minutes. Odd about 10% of the Elite field got to race an hour, then the other 90% got to race an hour and 5 min. plus. Let us all race for 30, 45 and an hour please.

The course is awesome, as usual, TJ and the crew at JB always throw some great stuff out there and did so this round. Karen and Doug Hamilton volunteer a ton of time at this park, building and maintaining the mountain bike trails, they also regularly keeps us informed about the condition of the trails at the park via Facebook. I say thanks to those that put this together and for CapCity to help sponsor this fine event.

Usually this JB race is in November around Thanksgiving and the ground is cold as well as the temperature. This day however, the temperature during my race would hover around 60 some degrees and sunny. The fortunate part for most of us racing later in the day is the sun and other racers were drying out the course with each race. It rained most of the week of the race, which proved to soften a few sections of the course, including the section from the start. It was a false flat as some say, but basically it’s a 3 to 5% hill with some super bumpy grass and some life sucking soggy, saturated ground. Lots of guys in my race were really going backwards on this section, my plan during my race was shift down a few gears, stand up, tell the legs to shut up and throttle myself all the way up each time. Once we got up to the ‘top’, we rounded a new wildflower field that was quite awesome and smelled great each lap, then back down a bit into some twisty’s, over two tree/logs, and then back up that same false flat hill just on the other side of the flower field. The logs were not really a factor I don’t think in the race per say of separating the field one way or another in my race at least. They were just big enough that they could be crossed without stepping off the bike, if you had some skills and were willing to take the risk, however, I choose the conservative method and got off my bike. There was one other set of barriers, a double set, over by the popular twisty bits near the park Gazebo. This area is always a fun set of turns and slickery grass, where you must find the balance of speed, pedaling, driving your bike, leaning while pedaling, upper body position and the like. It’s always one of my favorite areas of the cross races at JB.

We get our call ups according to who’s leading the OVCX series, not one f’ing mention of CapCity, and then line up according to registration. I am about 3rd or 4th row, and snag a spot right behind my buddy Matt Stierwalt. He’s a badass, I figure if I can stick on his wheel for a majority of the race or at least keep him in sight, I will have a good day. We’re off, I am sitting in about top 15 maybe into the first turn and surprised where I am as we round the flower field. Guys are racing like it’s the world championship and cutting others off, running into course stakes, course tape, etc. 

My heart rate was up there, but I was able to recover as sections of the course got stacked up in certain areas with racers and as the pecking order was formed. I knew we’d only be racing a few laps and each one had to count. I went after my goal of shifting down two gears, standing up and throttling it up the false hill each lap, passing racers and putting distance on those behind me. Scott Young a few other guys I knew were going to be giving me a run for my money. Scott was easy to spot, Stierwalt was gone, James Turner was still in my sights but gaining time on me here and there in front of me. The toughest thing to do I’ve found during these races is keep your brain going, keep thinking, keep focusing on who is in ‘your race’ who you need to go after and when to put in an effort to distance those behind you…The guy in the specialized kit, Michael Seaman and Scott Bond came around me near the double barriers I think and just kept distancing themselves from my front wheel. Uggg. I pushed hard to stick with them on the third lap, and by the time I got to the Gazebo, I almost threw up. 

I guess I had done some damage, since looking at the timing, my fourth lap was my slowest at 9:27. I recovered for my final and fifth lap for a 9:21.

Sad to know, I faded a bit in the last two laps, from my best lap of 9:15 which was Lap2’s time and my Lap3 time being within .01 second of Lap2 at 9:16. If I had ridden more consistently with a bunch of 9:15 laps, I might have won my race or at least been podium material, so lets hope my fitness improves as it should each week of racing.

With my calve issues at hand I was pretty worried about running full speed over the logs or over the barriers. As I got to lap 4, the legs/calve seemed to be responding to faster and faster dismounts back by the gazebo. This was a confidence booster, so, with the bell lap, I put the afterburners on and fought hard to keep some distance between myself and Scott Young and the other guy with him, who I had no clue if he was in my race or not, however, that’s not a bad thing when you don’t know, it pushes you, forces you to go hard and maintain a hard pace. One last time up the false flat, the legs felt good, so I gave it one last super hard effort to try to maintain my gap. I think I got passed around the sand pit and right before the finish line, I just have no idea if he was a 35 or 45 guy. I didn’t bother sprinting for it, he had already done the damage, I looked back to make sure no one was there and rode across the computer finish line for 7th place in the 45+.

I finished 17th out of 64 total racers.

For my third-race of the season and a week-break since my second race, I think it’s a sign things (fitness and power) are on track to have some fun this season.

So, lets just chat a bit about the timing and what the lap results show via OVCX. The Top 10-15 of the CAT 4 race all need to move up. The Top-10 of the CAT 3 Open races also need to move up. The winner of the CAT 3/35+ has lap times early in his race, to compete in the Elite race for sure, however, his last two laps he was going backwards.

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.

the wreck - top 10 guys way over by the third tree?

James T and I battle for sand

someone thought they were coming around...

Glen throwing sand in my face

The season is not over yet!

OVCX -John Bryan State Park-Ohio State Championships

OVCX / CapCity Cross - Ohio State Cyclocross Championship Race -11/29/2009
One of my favorite races all year. Whether or not it is or is not the big state race of races. I love the park and the land in this sweet little park outside of Yellow Springs, Ohio and home to Antioch College. If you ever saw any episodes of The Twilight Zone, you may have not known, Rod Serling, the voice of the original TZ episodes, also graduated from this small school.
Now, off to the bike races with the coolest beard I could muster.
TJ and Phil let the course map out a week or so before the race, so we all got to see the new start location and a new fresh layout for 2009. Our start was on the road at the bottom of the hill entrance, which worked really well. Once at the top of the hill, where the ground leveled, we made a sweeping left hand turn onto the grass and towards the woods. My wife reminded me, that the Elite Masters men, all pedaled hard, full throttle, all the way up the hill across the grass and into the first sweeping turn. I followed her advice from my second row start, but didn't get my right foot clipped in right away and quickly got pushed back to about 15th into the grass. Not bad, I thought, I could pick off riders in the twisty
bits and go hard for the first two laps. This seemed to work, but I couldn't quite catch James from Trek Cincy. James, Gers, O'Shaughnessy and that pre-puberty fast kid Haley were all right within reach in the twisty section around the Gazebo and giant rock. On the last two laps, James was taunting me, saying, "COME on, come and get me" nice James! :) It was fun and certainly made me think about why we all race. A few things that made this state championship special, my parents and my sister all came out to watch me race. I actually had a one x one race with the Team Spin/ RR Donnelley racer, Peter Deucher.
Peter and I really gave each other a race, we threw it down like two wild caged dogs. It was amazing, to have the fitness and legs to stay with Peter on his accelerations, but also to have the fitness to trade off leads with him. We really battled elbows into the woods and before the double sided sand pit the last few laps. "Quite a show", my dad commented about our battle. Peter even apologized about the scrappy elbows into the woods, but I wasn't mad...I was happy to really race with someone for once, where I am usually out in la la land between the front 8 and the next group back. So, thank You publicly Peter, for a great race dude, props you were killing it. One last bonus of this day, the State Championship for the Tandem Cyclocross race, yeah that's right it happened. Glen, Kyle, Jon, Tom, Mason and Andy all killed each other racing their tandem bikes. It was a sight, I am not sure the OVCX crowd really got it. They watched, but I consider the ovcx racers quite the serious bunch; I am sure they didn't see the irony in the race, especially since Andy and Mason wore costumes.

Since Glen and Jon killed themselves on the tandem, I got to blow by my buddy Glen early in the race. I finally beat Brian C. from BioWheels, my first time beating him this year - he's had a great season.

I ended up 11th place out of 43 starters. I was super happy with the course, my race result and my family being there to see this stage performance. I could hear the familiar voices from my Mom and my sister and their cowbells each lap, near the barriers. My wife observed, my Dad counting my race-place the first few laps and got more and more excited counting and learning I was moving up from 18th place and picking off riders. During the last ten-years or so of my bike racing, my Dad has been to very few, but when he does show up, he always has coaching wisdom to pass along. I value his advice, coaching wisdom and presence. He has over 35 years of football coaching experience. He has a way with words, like the Bear Bryant's or Vince Lombardi's of the world - he can sum up sports saying very little.
After a local Crit, five years ago, he threw out this Dad gem, "why weren't you up there with those guys?", referring to the ones leading the race.
My only post-race defeated response, "I don't know Dad, I just wasn't"
His logical response, "...well, next time, get up there with those guys."

Another Ohio State Championship on the books... I tried my best to 'get up there with those guys,' Dad.

John Bryan State Park – OVCX #9/CAPCITYCROSS #7

JOHN BRYAN STATE PARK – OVCX #9/CAPCITYCROSS #7

Wow, what a race, what a course, what F-U-N.
I wrote after my tubie flat (glass on the course) at the Gun Club and my overall disappointment and moment of being pissed - cross is supposed to be fun and this race certainly renewed my view of what cross fun means.
I decree this course was of my top 3 favorites for 2008. Lots of flow like a great mountain bike trail or car racecourse without a ton of climbing. Although, my Polar file showed about 795 feet of climbing, it sure didn’t seem like that much, compared to the UCI Harbin race. I think John Bryan provided steady not steep climbing and not all at once, wall type climbing, which Harbin is known.
We had 40 Men line up for the CAT 3 race and I was on the second row behind Mr. Sandbagger, along with the other 08’ season sandbaggers who were sitting front row.
There has been some chatter about this – this week – I might have helped stir the pot some – me oh no - the issue for me is, yes I am sure you would like to win the overall award for the CAT for the Season, but you know, if you have won more than 3 races or been in the top 3 of 3 races or ok let’s say 6, then dam it, you should fricking CAT up, I am sorry. Let someone else win. It is not going to be me – YET. I am close, but not quite top 5 material in the B’s yet. But these guys, just week in and week out slaughter the rest of us some weeks by minutes, not 30 or 45 seconds, minutes. That is silly and why I am calling these fuckers out. Blah blah, it’s their first season of winning, blah blah train harder and we should all quit our bitching – well, CAT up and race with those that you should be – this one guy – he slams us in this race, then goes out into the A race, and sits 8/9th over almost the entire race, sitting on a CAT 1 wheel most of the race, then blows up and finishes like top 14 or something – I can’t think of a better way to bitch slap everyone in the B race.
Looking at the photos, you can see a bunch of us in laughing and heckling “some people” about sandbagging. That moment was almost as fun as the race itself.
The course started with a slight uphill with a sweeping narrowing turn to the right then a sweeping turn to the left. We wrapped around the field near the finish start area and went around a few trees into the first set of barriers – the field was getting strung out at this point. After the wooden barriers we went up towards Gazebo land hit some pavement then a hard hard fake you out right turn almost straight into a tree then a hard left a the tree into the first sand pit. I thought this one was the toughest obstacle of the day, since I had to place to really put in a serious acceleration to get through it. I ended up running it after the first lap attempt and just glided my bike on top of the sand, without actually picking it up, which was an interesting mid race experience and seemed to work well in this race.
Other highlights were, what I call the Gazebo section, where we came into a large grass area on the right outside, then circled inside center and then back out, genius design, I could pedal through the entire thing with my high bottom Bracket, thank you Ridley. I was putting time on guys here every one of the 7 laps, by just maintaining pedal strokes. I might have been smiling every-time in this section.
After the first sand, we went across the park road into a nice right then left turn onto a grass section that was very fast into a sweeping wide right turn around a tree. Back around a tree to the left and another uphill to the left. This section was a big deal breaker if you could maintain speed and pedal through and around these trees. I managed to just stand up, get in the drops and go hard, in a hard gear. At the top of the small rise, I would settle in and spin to recover a bit on this somewhat downhill grass/dirt section in the woods, behind where our car was parked. We then headed back across the park road, turning hard right and lining up for a good sprint across the other side of the sand pit.
We had two standard, wooden barriers, the standard OVCX series, double sand pits, and two large, large logs with quite a bit of running between them. We then hit the outside of this grass section against the tree line and went into a long semi flat to light downhill and into the woods onto single-track. Once on the dirt, the first sweep turn to the left, required picking the right line and having the right position on your bike otherwise, you would end up hitting sticks and trees on the outside line of the single track. A slight bit to the right and then long sweeper dip to the left and then out of the woods and back out on the grass. Some twisty stuff and back into the woods on onto the dusty single-track.

I ended up Top 15 with Ben B and the BioWheels guy just in front of me, I mean just and Layne was on my ass chasing me down like a rooster in a hen house. Ben said he was watching me like a hawk and working really crazy hard to keep me away from him. That's good stuff. A great day on the bike. A few of us went into Yellow Springs for some food and heat. Good times, good day.