Mercer Cup

For the past two years, the biggest names in cyclocross have come to New England to show off their trade. We have been able to witness these champions race at Nationals in Providence or the Crank Bros national series in Gloucester. This year though, the calendar was empty. The closest that the Crank Bros series would come would be New Jersey. On whim, I decided that this would be a great opportunity to race and watch the reigning national champion Trebon in action...not in the same race though...



Friday afternoon, ML, Dave C and I headed to my buddy Tom's house in Jersey. The plan was to stay there for two nights and travel to the races. Saturday morning we gathered our stuff and headed out bright and dark. For someone used to racing at noon, leaving the house at 7 seemed wrong. The hour 20 minute trip took us through Trenton and an extra 40 minutes. Arriving at the course 35 minutes before my start, I had to argue with the promoter to get my number since registration closed 60 minutes before the start, rather then the typical 30. With number in hand, I quickly ran back to the car, changed and returned to the starting grid. Screw the warm-up, we jut didn't have that kind of time. By random assignment, I started six or seven rows back, it was tough to tell from that far from the front. On cue, the front racers took off, and us in the back rows waited patiently for the accordian to get moving.



This was a great course. There were long sections of straightaways, some twisty technical sections, oligatory barricades, a monster sand section and new to most riders, a fly-over (more on this later). After the course narrowed off the start/finishing straight, the pace quickly slowed down as riders muscled their way forward. On Thursday, I replaced my 50tooth front chainring with a 46tooth. With this more manageable gear, I was able to continually move forward on the straight sections. Dropping into the small ring, I ground around the technical corners. Of caution, many of the corners were extremely greasy. By relaxing though, I found myself able to keep the bike upright. Again, the course opened itself to long straight aways and I move up. The course bend back and forth over itself so many times that it as easy to see where other riders were, but not ascertain if they were chasing you or you chasing them. While my small group hammered along, we took the right hand turn into the sand section. This part of the course was about 150 feet long, six to ten inches deep and perfect for a volleyball game. Not so perfect for a bike race. The best thing about competitive cycling is the amount of testosterone raging. Too embarrassed to dismount and run with their bike, about half a dozen guys tried to ride through it. Nearly all found themselves launched over their handlebars when their bikes slowed. Not to be outdone by the cat 2/3 racers, the elite men and U23 had three times as many people ride through it, only to succomb to the same fate. Check out the resulting photo here.



Out of the sand, the course smoothed out before the flyover. The course creators built a ten foot tall staircase that riders ran up, remounted and rode over and down the other side. This looked cool and was cool. The earlier races actually had reports of riders sliding on their butts, dragging their bikes with them rather then riding down.

The race started out poorly for me. The random staging process had me about seven rows back, in a field of eight rows. When the gun went off, I found myself casually clipping in and getting up to speed, as there were tens of riders in front of me. Starting at the back of the race had a number of advantages I wasn't used to. For almost the entire race I was moving forward, passing riders, and leaping from group to group. Starting at the front typically has me going hard, blowing up and drifting back. While the Saturday course had a number of long open sections where you could ramp the speed up, Sunday's course was more technical in nature. Add in a constant drizzle or rain on Sunday and the course was very tough. I felt I rode strong on Saturday, yet only posted a 30th place finish. If I had started at the front, what could have been! Well, Sunday I started at the front, second row!, and went backwards the whole day. I finsihed 30th again. With such a national presence at the race, this was a good result.