Gateway Cross Cup

Originally the plan was to hit the Gateway Cross Cup en route to Madison for the USGP races. Hence, with Hermann in the days leading into this race, then UCI races to follow, I registered for the Men's Open for some competition, but hopefully not as tough as the UCI field. Alas, due to some untimely work deadlines, I ended up having to scratch Madison this year, and make St. Louis a day trip.

After seeing the course, I was really excited to race this course. It had some definite similarities to Madison, being generally wide open and on grass. This course also had almost no elevation change. There were two sets of mini stairs, a flyover run-up, and sort of tricky barriers off a right hand corner. I camped my stuff with the 360 tent and did my warmup thing.

My starting position was in the 4rd row, near the center. Definitely not optimal, but not terrible either.Upon starting, I got a little boxed in but moved up a few positions, then coming off the pavement, someone locked up the brakes and went all sideways. Fortunately no one crashed as a result, but I lost several more places here and was now in the back half of the field.

I was a little concerned about this, but didn't panic. At the first 180 corner, I could see there was already some separation of the front of the field from the rest, so I knew I had to move up fast. I got a few spots on the first stair section by dismounting early and running by some breaking riders, then a few more over the barriers. After that there were some long open sections where I made up some more ground. Coming over the flyover, I had put myself in the top 15, but could see the gap at the front widening. About this point I picked up Mark Savery, Midwest Trek CX Team. We hit the second set of stairs and went through the S/F line moving into the top 10 and gaining ground on the front.

By the end of the second lap it was just Mark and I, and there was one rider (Taylor Carrington, Carmichael Training) off the front by about 15 seconds. We worked together for the next two laps and by the end of lap 4 we were a group of 3 with a couple of chasers about 30 seconds back to us.

Making the catch

It started to get pretty dark at this point, and the three of us seemed pretty evenly matched. We traded attacks and pulls at the front for the next two laps, but for every attack there was a counter, and nothing was sticking. Every time I was at the front I was in full attack mode, trying to gain any ground. Every time I thought I had a little gap, it was gone the next moment. With long shadows from the lights it was pretty easy to see when you regained your tail.

Leading into the barriers.

Finally, with 2 to go, I was seeing some signs of fatigue. After one attack it took some time for Taylor and Mark to catch back on. They caught up, but I continued to lead. Attack, surge, sprint. Every corner I tried to get some advantage. Nothing stuck. Finally, over the last set of stairs that lead to the final few turns of the lap, I sprinted into it, ran the stairs well, had an excellent remount and they were gapped.

I held a couple second advantage around through the SF line and saw that my advantage had grown to a couple of seconds. Full gas. I was feeling super strong, and went through the first quarter of the lap very smoothly. Suddenly on a corner, there was a medic waving me to stop. Someone was laid out flat in the corner and needed medical help. I slammed on the brakes, but they let me through. Unfortunately, this let Taylor back on. Mark was a little off the pace.

We wound around together and I was a little deflated from this. I put in some more small surges, but Taylor was not giving an inch. He attacked. I followed, we went into the last set of stairs together and I surged to the outside to try and come around. He moved outside and clipped my front wheel right as I was remounting. That put my bars in the tape and I hooked my lever on a stake. Ugh.

Dismount, regain momentum, but he had a huge gap. I risked everything and chased with reckless abandon but couldn't bring it back. So he got the W and I followed in only a second back.

Taylor apologised afterwards for the mishap but that is racing. I should have never let him lead. Somehow my mentality in all the other laps was total aggression, but in that last half I let him have the front. Stupid, but I will learn. Mark took 3rd.

In the end it was one of the funnest, most hard fought races I've done. Loved the course, loved the fans (Esp. the 360 team by those stairs - thanks for the cheers guys). It would have been especially fun to do the UCI race, but that would have made an even later drive to KC. I hope this race becomes a fixture on the UCI calender.