Saturday, day 1, was rough. To keep it short… bad start, got chopped which sheared off the ratchet on my shoe, flatted twice, after all that I just rode high tempo to save myself for Sunday. I had these same mechanicals at Gloucester, and knew something was wrong with my tire setup. I tried borrowing another pump on Sunday before the race and realized my pump gauge has been reading 10psi high since at least Night Weasels, so I’d put in “30psi” but it would actually be 20psi.
I got some decent sleep Saturday night on a friend's couch in a house literally across the street from the venue, which was super convenient.
Now with proper pressure in my tires, and a fire in my belly, I had a great start on Sunday, moving up from 3rd row to ~12th at the holeshot. About 1.5 laps in, I had comfortably solidified my place in the second major group, which was around 6 of us in places ~7-12. I stayed calm, took some turns on the front, and the group eventually whittled down to 3, Davis, Rice and I, after Chabanov flatted out and others were dropped.
There were some “cat-and-mouse games” going on between Davis and Rice, as they race together a lot, so I ended up on the front quite a bit on the pedal heavy course, which was kind of dumb in hindsight. I towed us up to Selander and Livermon, about 25% into the race. Riding behind these guys was surreal. It was amazing to be racing with them and feel comfortable, like I belonged there. We (the original trio) hung on the back of Selander and Livermon for a lap, then they got a gap in a very tricky section and were gone.
Davis and Rice followed every single one of each other’s moves, even if that meant chopping me hard, several times in the case of Davis. His last chop, with ~1.5 laps to go, nearly crashed me out, forcing me to unclip, which opened up a gap that I couldn’t close. He came up to me to apologize after the race, which I appreciate, but I wish he hadn’t done it in the first place…
I rolled in solo for 9th, stoked out of my mind that I finally cracked the top 10 and captured my first UCI points! No more random draws! No more last row starts! Hopefully not much more scrub zone chaos! More top 10s and more points will hopefully be easier now. Last year I drove home from DCCX with a broken wrist, so I'd say that this year went better
Next up is HPCX in New Jersey!
