Derby Cup CX

Lousiville Cross

My first UCI race of the year a category 1. Toby and I made the trip to Louisville to race the Derby Cup. It’s held at the Eva Bandman park in Louisville, Kentucky a dedicated cycle cross park. It is really a cool venue with a permanent fly over, boulder run ups,  technical off camber, short punchy climbs.  The course is one of my favorite races. Located in Louisville a super old beautiful city. We have family in Louisville so its a bonus to make the trip.

  

Day-1 The race started on the pavement and about a 100 meters in out of the corner of my eye I could see  riders started  divert right to what soon would be a collision - I accelerated and manipulated through the field of riders .  Everyone in fight to that single track had riders spread across the track.

Then as we come the first corner onto the grass there is a mud pit , that covered the entire path. There was a ‘line’ on the left. My plan was to stay far right, and as I suspected riders went down on the left. I was on the right in this very soupy mud as I entered the rider  in front of me goes down . I managed to get through the chaos and just off the back of the leaders. I merged my way up and sat about 8th wheel. I decided to be patient and hold onto the this group. The group started to split however, I was still sitting in 8th position. Then throughout my race I would get passed one by one. I just focused on riding my race and ended up in 13th. 

 Day-2 Uci c.2 

Once again I was the 38th rider and on the 4th row, I started in the same position and had ridden all alternatives going into todays mud pit , the race organizers widened the mud section by expanding the tape adding in some sand to help absorb some of the thick mud.   I ride through the middle of the mud pit. A little bit more energy however, I didn’t want to get caught up in any crashes.  I ended up sitting in 7th position on the first lap. I was feeling pretty good, maintained my composure Until the second lap. I had slid out going into this off camber, falling on my drive side unable to get out of my pedal made this quite comical . I would end up finishing 21st on the day. 

in the pit for toby