Toronto, and goin' to Louisville!

Toronto was good. Nay, Toronto was great. The weather was cold enough for me to field test the new fleece skinsuit (awesome!), and the caliber of field was good enough for me to put in a really good struggle.

The drive was tedious, and it snowed a little in Buffalo (c'mon, Buffalo, it's only October...), so I was expecting the cold, and came prepared. The course for Saturday was awesome, and during Friday's pre-ride I realized I was inadequately geared. I went in expecting a beat-down. Yay, I got one!

I got a front row call-up, and had a good start. Went off the pavement in about 4th place, and quickly did my best to drop about 15 places. The course was fairly twisty, but also had some really good straight sections, one set of barriers, a set of about 3 sand-filled steps, and (wait for it) a big-ass hill that put a severe hurt on me. I knew I was going to have to run that hill every lap, and judging from all the compact cranksets around me, the locals all knew the hill well. So I ran with my trusty single-ring, and everyone rode by me. From then on it was about catching back on and trying not to lose too many places. The good part was coming down the other side of the hill, where folks kept generously sliding out and letting me catch back on. We rode 4 laps in the Master 3 race, which was probably between a cx3 and cx4 here in the States. I rode a so-so (but all-out!) race to a glorious 29th, and I think "For Those About to Rock" was blaring from the P/A. Then it was all beer and hot dogs for the rest of the day. What a life!

Sunday's course was much better suited to my abilities (and gearing!) and was more rolling. Still twisty, and required a lot of punchy accelerations, but definitely no big climbs. The ground was wet, and a little slippery in spots. There was one run-up, but it was prefaced with a ditch, and while some riders cleared it to ride the hill, I didn't feel the reward was worth the risk. Beside, what's the point in riding 2 miles per hour, when you can hoof it and be a little faster? There was a decent little muddy ditch, with a good tire-grabbing width, followed by a little bit of sand (my favorite course feature - mud + sand = "can't stop") followed by a series of tight up-and-downhill turns. Sweeeeet. I rode this race well, finished 18th (of 36, so I hit my goal of top half), had nothing left in the tank, and came back from a few bike lengths to beat out a guy at the line.

In all, the racing was great, I got to meet some nice folks, it was wicked cold (to us), and most importantly I had fun. I'm definitely going back next year, unless they remember that I ran that hill and caused a big pile-up, in which case I might take a pass...

Now on to USGP Derby Cup in Louisville! The Nashville folks are going to show up in force, I'm pretty pumped.