Until the Snow Ends

Is it possible to HYPE nationals five days after it's over?   I'm not sure.  But I started looking at these numbers and I got psyched for the 2016-17 'cross season, so it was good for something. I wrote about the crossresults vs USAC predictions last week, but now we can look at what actually happened! The problem is that you really can't judge the quality of a prediction off a single trial.  Take, for example, my latest favorite thing to hate:  Powerball.  Anyone who bought a Powerball ticket I would predict to lose.  However, some people won Powerball -- but that doesn't mean the prediction that they were going to lose Powerball was the wrong  prediction, right? Nevertheless, it's fun to look at, anyway.  Let's go. Elite Women Katie Compton collected her 12th title in a row, but Georgia Gould gave her the toughest run for her money she's gotten in a long time.  Guess whose got two thumbs and a website that predicted Georgia ...

I distinctly remember Steve Johnson telling me that if we didn't agree on a price for selling crossresults to USAC that they would copy it. And they did!  Like, all of it ...to the best of their ability, which means it's a reasonable facsimile of crossresults now, but not an exact clone, and that clone also has a "race predictor." (I like the part where they didn't change the name).   In any case, now we live in a magical world with no less than TWO competing mathematical predictions for the United States Cyclocross National Championships! Amazing times we live in.  Let's check it out. The major differences in the algorithms are: - Crossresults includes non-USAC races, most relevantly stuff that happens in California, Oregon, Washington and Europe - USAC's ranking is based on your best 5 results in the calendar year, while crossresults is based on the best 5 in the last 10, so crossresults theoretically pays more attention to recent results than US...

I've been remiss on the blogging front, because I killed my GoPro (more on that later) and blogging without videos just seems soooooo 2008.  But CSI was great, we've got a cup of coffee and an hour, let's DO THIS! CSI Day 1 The Saturday course remains one of my favorite in New England, despite the fact that there is a GOD AWFUL WINDY POWER SECTION in the lower field, because everything else is jam-packed with FUN:  sandpit, runup, rideup with stairs that you could only ride if you were insanely motivated, pro line downhill, rad woods. Stoke was high.  Random number was also high.  But it's okay!  I sliced and diced through the aforementioned power section and was deep into the core of the field heading into the fun section on lap one.   But then, as I was passing some guys on the outside of a turn, the standard UCI-lap-one-almost-crash happened where a tangle led to a chain reaction of five people barely-not-crashing.  Which was great, exc...

I just checked, and in my 10-year cyclocross career I've raced Putney eight times.  EIGHT!  Pretty sure the only events on the list that can top that are Gloucester and Cycle-Smart (9).  I remember cheering for Dan Coady there ten years ago, right before he rode into a tree in a downpour, back when I was a Cat 4 but I hung around the races all day because cyclocross was so cool .  Five years ago it was also the race I went to right before my whole life exploded , but the beauty of five years is that now that's just another funny thing that happened at Putney. The old course (did you think we were done with blogstalgia?  HA)  used to be a sub-6-minute powerfest, with a brief technical section up around the shop and then riding the perimeter of the corn field, then the road, then the runup.  It was BRUTAL for people with bad steady-state power (hi) once they lost the draft.   Slowly, though, the course has changed, and it seems like each yea...

I raced Fruitlands Cup of Cyclocross on Saturday.  It went very, very badly.  Apparently not sleeping, not eating, and not riding for a week and then riding the most physically demanding cross course in New England is not a good plan.  I was sad from the gun and got sadder.  My major achievement was not dropping out in the hope of "getting open" for Orchard Cross, The Biggest Grassroots Race in New England (tm),  the following day. It kinda sorta worked. It certainly made me appreciate riding quite a bit better on a quite a bit easier course. Rumors that Orchard Cross was much more power-oriented than years past proved to be a bit overblown -- I thought it still felt much closer to "balanced" that "disgusting roadie power fest and I hate you guys." The holeshot was a total downhill sketchfest on tractor ruts.  I survived.  I might have advanced my position (27th?  seriously I am staged 27th in a local 1/2/3 this is what I have become?!?...

Last weekend Christin and I went on and adventure to the Mid-Atlantic, because there was a UCI doubleheader four miles from where she had to be for work that week. Mid-Atlantic UCI racing is an exotic thing that I rarely sample.  It is a mysterious land of single tape, @gregwhits, and a healthy scrubzone full of dudes I have never raced with before. But!  Lest you measure your race quality in double-tape, let the record show that the day one HPCX course was DOPE.  There was a lot of turning and a lot of climbing, but somehow the climbing was broken up enough to be shockingly tolerable, except the finish straight which was just a good old fashioned WOW THIS HURTS section. I drew a crappy start spot but nailed the clip-in and was shortly having to back off before I accidentally passed someone who was actually good and got in their way soon after. Then some dudes tangled going into turn one and a lot of us put feet down and that was the end of my good start. The de...

Mansfield Hollow I found out this year that Ron, the Mansfield Hollow promoter, first ran this race in 1983.  This race is ONE YEAR YOUNGER than me.  Apparently there were a few years in the 90s that it didn't happen, so it's not the longest-running race in #NECX (I think that would be Putney, right?), but still.  32 years and counting of a surprisingly good course on the shores of some artificial lake in middle of nowhere, Connecticut. Because the race is 32 years old, it doesn't buy into modern BS like crossresults staging, so we lined up in proper scrum fashion, and I missed the scrum.  So that was back row out of almost 40 guys. And the holeshot was like a 12 second sprint into one of the twistiest parts of the course so... at the back I stayed, more or less. Then we got to the downhill angled flood-control-log hop and I yelled "hopping in traffic, let's get wiiiiiiild" at Jesse and he repaid me by bobbling his hop and kind of sitting down on my fro...