Hey gang...I only recently "discovered" the New York City Cyclocross FB page, but the most common post is folks offering up rides to races. Which seems super cool and generous and helpful.

Ex-KCC Nelson Martins is going down to Cooper River and Caffeinated Cross this weekend and appears to have room for 3.

Anyway, if you aren't already clicked into this page, probably worth a "like/follow"

https://www.facebook.com/groups/211715905548876/?fref=nf

Anyone willing to give me a crash course on cyclocross (perhaps tomorrow, friday afternoon), or a link to some videos, for mounting and dismounting?

Scott, happy to meet sometime next week

GCN vids are cool, some will be useless, some gets detailed on the technology, almost none touch on technique.https://www.youtube.com/embed/28LnQcMuk7o?list=PLUdAMlZtaV10bPzydGqn6pX7L9lEa5Cwp

If you are looking for something that explains dismounts/remounts Arly's video is quick, and doesn't really cover it 100%, but is probably the best around for free:
http://bcove.me/3qc1v9uz
-- if you can do it like she does, you will be winning races.

A lot more detail in Power's Cross Camp
-- you'll find it/download for a price at the usual suspects (apple itunes, amazon, google play)
https://play.google.com/store/movies/details/Jeremy_Powers_Cross_Camp?id=EJt2_FVhsHA&hl=en



Adam Myerson is North American cyclocross guru, his video is old and dated, but the info totally current:
http://www.cycle-smart.com/store

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krWWbq_JnR8

Any of these will be helpful and will make more sense once you have tried a couple of things on the field.

Obvs: Nothing comes even close to riding and pushing yourself in the right terrain.  



Cheers! 

Raced Cooper River CX this morning. A lot of the NJ and Philly crew in attendance, at least those who couldn't make the trip to RI.
Winding, mostly grass course with some trees, ups and downs, a bit of off camber, some steps and made all the more fun by the dampness following the rain of the past couple days. I had a lot of fun seeing how much speed I could carry into the slick corners, feeling the tires hook up and then sprinting out.
This is my kind of course but in my state of low fitness I was only able to eke out a dead middle placing. I'll definitely be back to give this one a go when I'm in better shape.

I did CRCX this afternoon. It was a very different course than Jim saw this morning. It got peanut butter sticky in some places and frequently the turns were super slick, so frequently the outside line was faster. I started with a janky knee after crashing on my warm up going front wheel into a giant deep pothole/puddle that took me down. I had a slow start since I couldn't put any power down on my left side, and ended up quickly at the reverse holeshot, but started picking off other riders trying to carry more speed through turns and finding the grippier grass than the other riders. I put several riders behind me and was working on closing ground on another rider. 

Slow is smooth and smooth is fast. I should print this and put it on my top tube. I was trying to carry more speed in some places and had two crashes that each cost me time. 1st one dropped my chain, and the second one I banged my left knee just before the two slick steps... I lost a couple places because of those moves and the latter meant I really just pedaling with one leg. I just pushed to finish the race. I wanted to not get lapped, and get to finish the whole race. I got lapped at the line with a sprint with the winner of the race. I had a 75% reduction in crashes compared to Nittany, which in this case I consider a huge improvement. 

enjoying pizza, beer and a bag of peas on my knee to reduce the swelling from the clubbing it got today.

One of the things that I'm most proud about our/Myles' Supercross race? Is that we don't have a silly race ending traffic jamming prologue loops like at so many other races during the season. This is the 4/5 race from day 2 of Providence, but I had flashbacks to my own start in the cat 2/3 race.

https://player.vimeo.com/video/141358360

Day 2 wasn't the organizers' fault. That was moronic 4/5 racers' fault. It was nothing resembling a run up. Just a mild rise after a turn. Day 1 was a travesty though. Race over within one minute.

Jeffrey White said:

Day 2 wasn't the organizers' fault. That was moronic 4/5 racers' fault. It was nothing resembling a run up. Just a mild rise after a turn. Day 1 was a travesty though. Race over within one minute.

I totally agree, although for whatever reason it was the same in the 2/3's

I disagree here. As Jules pointed out the 2/3 race was EXACTLY the same. That camera could have been on my bike. In fact I feel like if they ran us up the run-up it might have been better.

Maybe? Hard to know for sure. Well..

Here's my thinking. Where we turned right, we could have turned left, similar width turn, but a longer stretch of wide before it turned into double track. The prologue loop had a wide enough turn one, but then one pedal stroke later, we're taking a right hand button hook onto the rise.

Now, at least we'd have a bit more wide open before the gravelly woodsy double track which was not insignificantly long, say about 5 seconds, which would cause more gradual slowdown. Then before day 2s run/ride up, things actually open up. With two distinct paths up the hill, apart from each other, each with marginally enough room for at least 1-1/2 riders to climb on each path.

I don't know, it still sucks to be at the back of these things, but I do feel like course designers don't give prologue loops enough thought.

I think it's noise. The start of any field with 150+ fast guys in it will have a bottleneck. And frankly if you're not in the first 3 rows you're out of contention anyway; so you're bottled with your competition.

I was more annoyed by the microphone noise in that video. OMG just use some EMD without paying the artist or providing attribution like everybody else posting their videos and be done with it. 

Marc, how are course designers supposed to create seperations to make the race safer without putting some challenging obstacle that will cause folks in the back to stop completely and start back up. If you have more than 75 riders, there is no way to move up from the back, unless you have discovered teleportation.

If you're smart enough to figure out teleportation, why are you doing cross? 

Dan Reiners said:

If you're smart enough to figure out teleportation, why are you doing cross? 

If you're smart enough to figure out teleportation, what ELSE is there to do besides cross?

You can blame the course designer or the promoters. But ultimately this is part of cyclocross racing.

If you start towards the back you will deal with traffic and often a bottleneck on the first two or three corners. Figure out where it'll be, expect it, and approach it correctly. If you do it right, often, you can pass 10-20 people for free.

BLAME? There is no BLAME in CX!

Only mud, cowbells and tears of joy/laugher watching people stack it while reaching for dollar bills.
(blame. yeesh)

easy does it:
https://youtu.be/o0oGMix5X44

^SO MUCH HOTNESS my computer just melted

what the hell are we watching!?!

Nationals.

http://ashevillesports.org/news-1/2015/10/6/cyclo-cross-national-championship-schedule-release-along-with-lodging-and-vendor-team-information

http://www.usacycling.org/2016/16cxnationals

just noticed these.., among a few "relay races" and left wondering WTF is USAC trying to do here?!?

More interesting is seeing what happens to the USAC budget for 2016 what with VW being their principal sponsor.

FWIW, I've been thinking about going to Nationals since last year. Not sure if the family can make it though...and my motivation then for such a big/expensive trip is significantly less.

Marc Bertucco said:

FWIW, I've been thinking about going to Nationals since last year. Not sure if the family can make it though...and my motivation then for such a big/expensive trip is significantly less.

While I would like to go to Asheville (and am still considering it) I think I'll probably just wait a year and make the two hour drive to Hartford. 

The last time Nats was in the NE was 2005 and 2006 in Providence. I missed those but I did attend in 1998 at Fort Devens MA.

I also went to the 1987 Nats in Bremerton, Washington. This is my hometown and at the time I had no f'ing idea what cyclocross was (or bike racing for that matter). I knew a bit more when they hosted it again in 1990 but I'd yet to race a bike myself. Odd choice of town to hold them but there must have been a driving force.

Now Bremerton is mainly known in the CX community as the hometown of Logan Owen who grew up (barely done with that) about a mile from my old house.

Agree with Jim. I mean, the Biltmore Estate is supposed to be a site worth visiting, but if I can't be there with family? I think I'm just excited that Nats is back in a place that's not a 6 hour flight to the middle of "Over-there." Okay, plus I thought I'd be a little better this year...haha.

CT though, can't stop won't stop.

6 hour flight? Asheville is a 12 hour drive. 750 miles from my home in NJ to our place in WNC, 1 hour from Biltmore.

Jim Feehan said:

6 hour flight? Asheville is a 12 hour drive. 750 miles from my home in NJ to our place in WNC, 1 hour from Biltmore.

I was just exaggerating. 12-hour drive is very doable for me (I do a 14 hour drive at least twice a year). I was saying I was excited that Nationals weren't in Utah or the West Coast this year.

Jim Feehan said:

6 hour flight? Asheville is a 12 hour drive. 750 miles from my home in NJ to our place in WNC, 1 hour from Biltmore.

Related, "our place in WNC?" Party at the Feehan's!!! (Raise the roof, whut-whut!) #whateverkidsaresayingthesedays.