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.