January 26, 2024I’m riding my bike again. It’s been a few months off dealing with some other issues, but I’m making my legs go ‘round in circles again. The big difference compared with last winter is that I’m riding indoors.
I got a Wahoo smart trainer in fall when the cyclocross season was getting smoked out and it was dangerous to go outside and breathe heavily. It was heavily on sale because it isn’t a full-on smart trainer that replaces your rear wheel and has a computer out front built in. It’s the kind that rolls against your rear tire.
October 17, 2023 In my first cyclocross race I was riding around afterwards and hit a pothole in Strathcona Science Park whacking my right ankle on my pedal and gouging a chunk out of it.
Training for my 2023 cx season I slipped my right foot and gouged my ankle on my big ring. This one probably could have used stitches.
Half a week before entering the Hop n Hurl race I was cruising downhill to Capilano Park for some good cx practice. The offroad downhill goes into Rundle park and is called get ready to rundle on TrailForks. I was descending on the hoods, not in the drops and I guess my weight wasn’t far enough back so when I hit the hard rut and my front wheel turned I went over the bars. I didn’t hit my head but got my knees, hip, wrist and ribs.
September 30, 2023 Race Info
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I came into this race knowing that last year’s Puncheur Cross was my favourite. Unfortunately I had a training crash the Tuesday before this race, which put me in kind of a bad place. Mostly scraped up, but also a bit of a bruised wrist and some bruised ribs. I figured I’d be okay to race still, but I wasn’t setting my expectations too high.
September 19, 2023 “Embrace the suck”[^1]
As a cx rider this ethos means a lot. In cross you’re often racing in bad weather, cold weather, slippery weather. The courses are designed to make it hard for you to go quickly, not like a road bike race. All the twists and turns and lack of traction can make it so the fast people don’t get to use their speed, and craftiness, technique comes to the fore.
August 31, 2023 As part of my season preparations I decided to at least try the midweek cx racing that goes on in Edmonton. It’s a bit weird because it’s so casual and hard to find information about. There are people asking questions in the Alberta CX Facebook group and you get a response with a screenshot from somewhere(?) giving a schedule. It seems that the people who know, know.
And holy crap did a lot of people know about it last night!
August 29, 2023 The Alberta Bicycle Association Cyclo-cross Cup begins this weekend with the Tubs on Tubs race and the Velocity CX and I am excited.
These races take place at Strathcona Science Park, which is a five minute ride from my house, so it’s my closest thing to a “home” race and where I do most of my ripping around on grass to practice ‘crossing. The other day I was out there and saw someone else also riding around on the grass and flagged her down. Turned out she was one of the race organizers planning out the course.
May 30, 2023 I joined a cycling club in 2023 and we have a coach. I have never had a coach before. I haven’t ever really done sports so I don’t know what a coach is supposed to do. But Kevin seems earnest and nice and is trying so hard to be helpful.
Before this season’s first race he held a racers’ meeting to go over the course using veloviewer and to talk about tactics and what we should be doing before a race. I was at work that night, so I asked if he’d be able to record it and he did. He talked about wind directions and planning and prep and where to attack the group if we had the legs.