Surf City Halloween extravaganza!

Yesterday's Velo Bella Surf City race was All-Time. Yes, the course was awesome. Yes, the weather was perfect. Yes, the Bellas and Fellas pulled off, yet again, a perfectly coordinated event with a huge turnout. Yes, there was cash and prizes for my race and thankfully no medals which is something I really appreciate (the racers want CASH). But the fact is, the costume race was through the roof with around 100 participants. It was about the raddest thing I've seen at a cross race, people really pulled out the stops with some really awesome and hilarious costumes!

My teammates Alex Work and Scott "buckethead" Chapin raced as Mexican wrestlers on an old Schwinn tandem:








(Photos: Photoblake)

They engaged the other racers in theatrical melee- at one point they were kicking the hell out of Jesus Christ, hopefully I can find some shots of that!

I am a lame nerd and my costume was the same as it is every weekend. I drove down by myself and spent the time in the car getting wound up and ready to dive headlong into the deep lake of pain that would be the mens A race. Because my race started at 2:30, I got to go ride for an hour in the morning and I was optimistic that my legs would be good.

I just put 2 "new old stock" Challenge Grifo's on my Easton EC-90 SLX wheels and I was hopeful that some nice sharp knobs would help keep me upright and carry me to a good finish, or, with some luck, the win. These are the classic Grifo tread, not the new tread with the extra side knobs because I can not find a pair of new ones anywhere. People have been going fast as hell on this tread for decades so I figured I will be ok with these old ones, but I sure wish I could just get my hands on some modern tires this year!

So anyway, Sabine gave us our race instructions and Kasey blew the whistle and we all pedaled as hard as we could. The field seemed fairly large, with Ben J-M, Justin Robinson and Cody Kaiser all present. Most of my A category teammates were also raring to go including Scott Chapin and Aaron Odell. Rich Maile was also on the start and he lit it up off the line, getting the holeshot with me on his wheel. We got a little gap and on the runup I passed Rich and (stupidly) kept on the gas for a little while because I was feeling good. Of course Ben, Justin and Cody caught me later on the second lap and I slotted in behind Ben and just thought I'd stay there as long as I could.

I was pretty happy that I could follow Ben's accellerations without much trouble. He is very smooth and he was clearly just putting down some fast laps and just going hard on all the parts of the track that would allow high speed. Because his efforts were predictable it wasn't too hard for me to be ready for them and just hang on for dear life as he cranked it up. I was doing alright on this sleighride, but so was Justin and Cody, who were also able to meet the demands and hang on to our group. We were really going hard up the runup- I was feeling fast on foot but not so fast that I couldn't manage to snag $11 worth of tips out of beer cans at the top! Many thanks to all the cheers/jeers/heckles at that spot, it was really fun to have a loud and raucous crowd urging us on!


(Photo courtesy of tastybite)

(photo courtesy of Lauren Haughey/Morgan Fletcher)

I think we might have done 4-5 laps when Ben made a mistake- he got just a little off his line up the short off-camber climb after the grassy ball field and crashed right in front of me! I like to try and be a gentleman and everything, but when Ben makes an error like this (and it doesn't happen too often) I have to take advantage of it. It is bike racing after all, and these things happen to the best of us so I ran around him and got on the gas right away!

I think this is when Cody fell off the pace and the race turned into a one-on-one battle for me and Justin once again. We settled into some good smooth laps and we both more or less kept on the gas to keep our gap on Cody and Ben, who was nowhere to be seen.

I somehow got confused and thought at 3 to go that there was only 2 to go and I just decided to pull out the stops when I was on the front and throw everything I had at Justin. I was digging really deep at every fast part of the course, especially up the short dirt road climb that we started on. I was happy that it seemed like I would only really feel bad from this every 3rd effort or so, but my legs were starting to cramp from the runup- I should have been riding that thing.

So when we came through the finish and heard 2 to go I was less than excited about trying to keep up my attacks but I was saved from that prospect by... a rear flat. Justin saw it and he was about as bummed as I was. Justin is top class. He almost slowed to give his condolences and even yelled to my teammates on the sidelines that I'd punctured to be sure I'd have a bike ready when I got to the pits.

I had a pretty long, slow ride over to Ryan who was ready for me with a bike.Cody came winging by me on the dirt road climb, but noone else was in sight. I think I had to ride about 1/3 of the track with my "NOS" Grifo flapping around, useless. When I got on my B bike, I had lost a lot of momentum and I had a slow lap and a half to the finish for 3rd. I wanted to claw back up to Justin and Cody, but I was blown like my tire and I just couldn't get going again with my cramping legs.

The drama continued on the front of the race though- Justin also had a flat on the last lap and he must have been lucky enough to get it before the pits because he changed bikes after getting caught by Cody and then had to sprint him at the end! Cody was the only one unaffected by mechanicals, Ben's bad luck continued with some kind of chain problem at the runup that resulted in his 4th place finish.

Cody Kaiser is quickly developing into one hell of a good bike racer and at 16 years of age, he's the top new prospect in nor-cal. His fitness is amazing and he was really doing a great job of keeping on the gas even when he'd gotten sawed off from the front group. He came damned close to winning the race yesterday and I'm sure he's now well aware that things can change fast in a cross race and with determination and focus doors can open late in the race! I'm really impressed at how well he's developed even in the last few weeks, Cody's coming up!

This was a great, dramatic race for us. Justin earned a hard fought win and even though it sucked to wreck a tire, and noone wants to see crashes determine the results, it was probably pretty fun to watch the cards get re-shuffled every few laps. I can't wait for next weekend!