racing cyclocross: what it looks like

For the benefit of my friends who don't race or ride off-road much, here's a video of the PIR Pro Paddock course, shot during the opening lap of the Mens' B race yesterday. Taken with a GoPro camera strapped to Matt Westermeyer's handlebar. Thanks, Matt!

Along the way you'll note a few uphill and downhill sections, and stretches where the mud gets deep and mucky. Towards the last third the course gets a bit twisty and turny and lots of fun. (One note: where the guys dismount and run their bikes up and through an opened chainlink gate, they are riding the rhythm section on the moto track, a especially muddy part of the course that was closed to the combined womens' classes because of the inclusion of junior women in our race. So the A's got to race it, and the Mens' B's got to race it, but not me. Waaaaaah!)

This is pretty much what it looks like when I race, except that Matt's twitchy fingers are shifting -- a lot, IMHO -- and when I ride there is only pedaling harder to go faster.