i have seen all kinds of stupid/fun ways to make cross fun again
I feel like those are things for people that are already there, planning on being there, or have been there in the past?
I want more first-time and beginner cx racers.
We had a few and they had a blast. I think we can look into our race entry fees for cat 5. Race time is only 25min for those fields, so I think we could lower our entry fee from $30 to $20. Maybe try to offer a first-time racer $10 promo (just to cover usac insurance & official costs).
Lots of people hear “racing” and get immediately turned off. I think that is the biggest hurdle.
It me.
Are those “tough mudder” or whatever things still a thing? They seemed real popular and remind me of cyclocross in that I think technically they were a race, but lots of folks just did them as an event.
That’s my perception anyways, that going to one of those would be fun and difficult and dirty but I would be cheered on no matter my finishing place and have the camaraderie of others who had been through the same thing.
I kinda thought Tuff Mudder was cyclocross marketed to people without bikes.
Tuff Mudder and the like are still competitions with yourself. At the end of the day, bike racing is still racing, there is one winner, and not everyone gets a finisher’s medal.
Our local series started doubling up Saturdays and Sunday races to get more races and max out venues, made me have no interest in actually doing the full series as a casual. Then, all the races have half as many participants, fans, etc.
NECX did this when i lived there and it was nuts. combo of awesome (if you really love racing) and terrible (if you have like…a life)
We’re only doing 1 double header in December. Next race is Nov 13th.
Did my first race in a couple of years today. Cornelia came and cheered for me. When I asked if she’d taken any pictures, she said “I didn’t want to multitask so I could either take pictures or yell at you. I prioritized yelling at you”. So no pictures, but she did give some good encouragement and good heckles.
It’s 40 degrees and raining. My first race is 9:15. No one from my team is here because all of them race single speed at 2:50.
Really rethinking the necessity of a warm up lap.
every time i’ve skipped the warmup i feel SO SHITTY for the first 15 minutes of the race and regret it every time.
Yeah. I did the pre-ride. It was worth it.
I also raced today and it was awesome. Lots of very long slow uphill grinds which of course my singlespeed was perfect for
@rabbi my friend Adrienne is headed out this weekend for a race in y’all’s hood. I think she is meeting up with your team, she’s with socal cross and trying to build up momentum for the season.
Yep. Got her pre-reg email a few weeks ago. Wishing we could get more folx from LA out here!
4.5 hours of course setup this afternoon. My feet hurt. Got about 85% done and the last bit should be eazy peazy. 1.67/2.7km course that should have some damp areas. The park is carving out some sort of path throughout the grass areas and right now they are just dirt… and pretty great to use. I wish the original weather forecast of 62° would have held up; supposed to be 79° tomorrow. Womp.
I am doing the elite race then leaving for a wedding. So I don’t need to teardown!
3rd in elite. Good battle. I never quite mastered the sand, but guy in front dabbed in the sand right in front of me in the last lap and I attacked. It was all power from there and he was unable to close.
I only did the cat 4 race in the morning this weekend. This course is notorious for being muddy and has the worse run-up of the series. It had been raining all night and there was a lot of water on the course when we showed up. Luckily the rain held off during the race. I started in the back of the pack because it’s more fun to pass people than to be passed.
I was able to get around some folks really easily as soon as we hit the mud. Most of it was pretty soupy, but some was really getting sticky and tough to ride through on the SS. The run up was terrible. I’d remembered to put in my long toe spikes and that helped a lot, but it was too steep to keep up my momentum. At the top on one lap a guy behind me dropped his bike on my heels. Got a little cut up from his chainring.
I ended up running some sections of the main field that were deep mud. Worked well but I would have been faster riding if I’d had a little more strength to power though. They ran the course around some sharp corners on a tennis court. I didn’t see anyone go down but it seemed inevitable with the water on the slick pavement.
Felt good overall and very happy to go home at 11:30 instead of 4.
After all was said and done we had 55 individual racers and 81 entries. Trending upwards!
M&W4/5 and M5 were the biggest fields of the day. We had 1(!) junior. Gonna be sending info out to be included in the local NICA newsletter.