CX Nats Tue update

Packet Pickup was slow on Tue night. Going to be much busier later this week. Pretty normal setup with typical SWAG.

Arrived in Madison around 2pm after spending Monday in Burlington, IA with my mom. Nice to see family on the trip up and it almost exactly breaks the drive in half. 4.5hours on Monday from KC to B-Town and 4hours from B-Town to Madison. Its pretty chilly up here for me given its been so friggin' warm in KC (no not complaining really). Hit the hotel first and just like Louisville we are staying at a newly built Extended Stay and it's just about perfect for K-Rocket and I. We always try to get a ground floor accessible room with a roll in shower because the rooms have plenty of room to spread out, a mini kitchen and also it provides an warm indoor bike wash!

Quick check-in, got dressed for a pre-ride, jumped in the car and 15 minutes later we are at the race venue. On the drive to the course we were pleased to see the location of our hotel is close to pretty much everything, Costco, Bike Shops, Target, Mall, loads of restaurants and of course the race. The venue has plenty of parking although not quite as convenient as the Louisville or FoCo USGP races but not terrible. If you want close parking they want $200 for "Team Parking" on site and well I am not paying for parking. Bill and the KCCX crew did spring for parking and already has a pretty decent spot on the grounds and he has offered up the space for us to use for our races (remind me to tip him for that).

The course is on a hill and pretty wide open for passing and has some areas that are super fast, and yup like the preview here says it is for sure bumpy. Did two laps with Karen checking things out and talking over lines and tactics. There has been some snow up here but only just enough to leave a thin icy coating all over the course. Temps have been below freezing since the last storm and today with the sun beating down @ 27 degrees all you KC MTB'ers know what was happening. Slime on frozen ground mixed with icy mix turf. Enough folks were out pre-riding that the course has some decent areas worn through the ice but it will all refreeze tonight. Passing may actually be a bit of a challenge even though the course is generously wide with the icy turf. Going to take some risks to win for sure but take too much risk and hit that frozen ground with speed and the weekend might be over...

After our two laps together we separated and rode at own pace for two more faster laps. I put in one full on race pace lap to end my pre-ride and this course is really deceptive. When you are just riding it the course is really nothing to be all that excited or worried about. At race pace it was a totally different beast. The longer climbs end in some punchy ups and then more climbs leaving you deep in the red, this will really separate the racers. The longer downhill section is as fast as you dare ride it and goes into a sharp right hander and over three uphill barriers (freshly put in) and an uphill remount. Twice I was flying down that hill into very hard braking into that turn then over the barriers and remounting in way to big of a gear, need to remember to downshift before I hit that turn. 45 minutes on this course are going to hurt and outside of the course not having a super technical area it is really pretty well balanced and will take about every skill you have and a big old bag of fitness to win it. Mix in that it will be warmish (above freezing) the ground will likely be slick and require constant focus to keep the rubber side down and your momentum going forwards.

Bikes messy and fingers frozen it was time to get warm, hit registration, grab food, find K-Rocket some warmer gloves, clean the bikes then relax before tomorrow's non-championship race. Karen is up at 9am and I am up at 11:30. She is predicted to finish 6th out of 26th and I am predicted to take 2nd out of 33.

Here is a link to the schedule for the weekend.

Here is the link to registration and were you can see your placement for call-ups (race predictor under the view registrants link)

The local Trek Store had two of these beasts on display, bet they are fun in the snow! (lots of warm gloves as well)

Been to three National Championships now, pretty much same swag at all three although the Grape-nuts are new.

Mini Kitchen and whipped up some quick dinner.

Dinner served with some Almond Milk and dark chocolate for desert.

Indoor roll-in warm bike wash courtesy of our hotel room. Best way to clean bikes on the road in the cold!