Louisville Cross Highlights

Rode in the Tour de Louisville Cross race this past weekend at Fisherman's Park south of Louisville. It was really a fun course and would have been a little more fun if we had just enough rain to soften the place up a bit. The dirt was hard as cement and very rough. Combined with the tight 180 turns through the course and long stretches of off-camber and it made for a challenge for even the higher classes of riders.

My two oldest daughters went with me and sat near the set of barriers to video tape for me. While they weren't the steadiest of hands, they did get these clips on camera, which provided some fun when spliced together. They were good at not getting face shots to protect the innocent...

Watch out for the Walnuts

Was out practicing cross last night and was reacquainted with a nemesis that plagues everyone this time of year in this area practicing cross. Hit one of these black walnut bastards with your front tire in a corner and you will be laying down in a hurry.

So, last night I was hitting a corner at the bottom of a quick descent and hit a walnut with the front tire. Went down very quickly and to add insult to injury I landed my knee on a walnut in the fall. Very sore and soon to show a fabulous bruise a bit later (maybe pictures of it later?).

On a related note I took a different route home on my bike looking for a more fun way through to Kingswood from the house. Was cutting through the woods/fields to the north of P&G and was confronted with a skunk. I came within 4 feet of being sprayed. The skunk has his back arched and his tail arched...I was his victim if he decided to let it rip....

What is up with new riders?

Finally back online after a long reprise due to work and family commitments. Also finally back on the bike and riding semi-decent.

Anyway, on the weekend rides on Saturday and Sunday morning there were new riders. Eveyone in the group is always happy to have new riders on the ride and generally very receptive to new people in the group, but why do they always act like they have never done a group ride.

On Saturday we had a guy join the group, seemed like a nice guy, but when the group was starting out he was attacking from the back of a group of about 35 people. Sure, there is no harm in doing this, but on an average group ride it is only going to excite others in the group. The other side is that attacking over the yellow line constantly on a course that he obviously did not know isn't the wisest thing to do.

So we had to take things into our own hands and split the group by attacking and get the guy isolated. We dropped the guy on the way back into Loveland (after the tracks and before Dallasburg on the return of the Beer Bottle route). He seemed like a strong rider and is more than welcome to the group if he can learn to ride with a group.

Sunday there were two guys that were unknown and new that were annoying several people in the group. The first half of the ride was pretty mundane and relatively slow. On the 2nd half we started to pick things up, but these two wouldn't rotate through the line, choosing to punch tickets at the back of a group of about 9 riders. Nothing will annoy people faster than punching tickets on the tail end of a ride, especially if you don't punch tickets properly and keep jumping out when you get to about the middle of the line.

So, again, we had to provide some education and dropped them up Zoar back into Loveland on the tail of the Yellow Box route.

Honestly, we like to have new riders, but maybe it would be wise to get to know the group before you start doing stupid stuff in the group.