2023 Cyclocross Season

My bikepacking trip to Vermont gave me some really good base fitness after 1200 miles of zone 1/2 in July and some intensity group rides in August so I was really looking forward to a great cyclocross season. I had high hopes for 2023, but unfortunately missed a bunch of races mid season due to minor injury and a few, including our own race AACX, due to Snipe regatta conflicts. But I closed out the season with a weekend of quintessential Belgian weather cyclocross. Rain, greasy mud and beer!

Rainy and muddy, a little bit of Belgium in the norther Virginia suburbs!
There were a LOT of slideouts on this greasy off camber section and the peanut gallery heckling game was really strong! No, it’s not me but the ABRT El Presidente. I cleared it every lap in my race 😉
Ahhh, nothing better than a double IPA from Bike Lane Brewing at 10am!

The season started really warm in early September at DCCX where there were actually weirdly summer-like thunderstorms in the late afternoon. In fact we never had any really cold weather all year, a bit out of the ordinary since I’ve been racing cyclocross for the last ten years. DCCX is always a happening with big 40+ 3/4/5 fields and exciting racing. This year did not disappoint. The next day was Falkorburg a race I hadn’t done before. It was a nice course with a steep flyover, which surprisingly nobody “endo-ed” on since the exist was pretty jarring. One thing I started to do this season was bring rollers to warmup on since I’ve alway felt I am never up to full throttle until far into the race when the damage is done. It definitely helped some, especially at Hyattsville where I was able to cool down after the first race and warm up for the second race easily.

Warming down on the rollers at Falkorburg.

There was an open weekend at the end of September so I searched around for a smallish race (I still have a dream of winning a CX race some day) and found one northwest of Philadelphia called Carpenter CX that I decided to do. Turns out that was a tropical storm weekend, but what the heck, it’s CX so why not. Lisa drove up with me for a rare cheering squad and it was indeed a muddy mess. But lots of fun. No luck on winning though…

What do you do during a tropical storm? Race CX of course. Like last year at Charm City during Hurricane Ian!

Next up was a local-ish event in Hyattsville. I rode both the 40+ 3/4/5 and the 60+ and did them both with equal vigor and unfortunately, strained something in my torso which was then exacerbated by a hard ride later that week and two heavy air Snipe regattas. I guess I was a little too amped up for the season and was stupid, and it set me back a month plus and I ended up missing 4 races I could have fit in the schedule after the Snipe season was over.

A glam shot with my thermal skinsuit at Hyattsville. Doesn’t look too bad while riding but off the bike, not so much.

To make sure I was ready to race again, I did a few practice rides and some off roading during Thanksgiving in Boston and was ready to hit the last CX weekend of the year for the Bel Air CX Festival and the Capital CX Classic at Lake Fairfax. They are both really fun and challenging courses and while I didn’t feel like I had much fitness – I gained my usual 10 lbs this fall 😱 – I was excited to get back “between the tape” as they say. I forwent doing the 60+ as a second “goof-off” race at Capital CX in the elf suit like last year given the result of doing two races at Hyattsville. And for better or worse, no one was doing Fireball handups at 9am so I was spared the choice of doing shots or not doing shots in the one race I did.

Running the up to the steps at Bel Air showing my extra 10 lbs. Photo Credit Nigel Samaroo.
Just after remounting past the barriers at Capital CX.

One of the really fun aspects of this season was the renewed interest in cyclocross in ABRT. A new edition to the team this year was an MTB squad of mostly younger guys (Cory Peterson, Tim Jessilonis, Jake Miller, Don Lustenberger and Nick Moreau) who also like to ride cyclocross in addition to full mountain biking. This group complemented the stalwarts (Mike Roth, Antonio Abadia, Mickey Thaxton, Guo Yang and me; sadly Charles Valade was out all year with a shoulder injury) so we had a good showing at events. Most events we brought the team tent and hung out, cheering each other on and couple that with some really good results with podium finishes by Cory, Tim, Jake, Nick and Matt Mitchell (see our new Instagram account that Don set up), we had some really good team camaraderie. And that may just be the best part of the season.

Post race at Capital CX (L to R: Matt, Mike, me, Tim, Don).

Except for the Hyattsville 60+, I did all 40+/45+ 3/4/5 events which are my favorite with large fields and no former pros and even though I am always the oldest guy in the race, it’s good racing for me. For my results, I finished with points about the same as last year (501.92 this year v. 497.53 last year – crossresults.com has all the stats), but my goal is generally to finish on the lead lap (mostly successful), get points in the 400s (lower is better, limited success) and beat the race predictor based on the points to date, which I did for every race I preregistered. I had hoped to do at least 10 races this year, but again due to the minor injuries, I missed Germantown, Rockburn, Frosty Cross and Tacchino as well as AACX and Ed Sander due to Snipe conflicts. Even retired, I still have conflicts. Sheesh, but I guess not a bad problem to have!

Oh, and what’s that rando bib “Church Creek” doing in the top picture? I also did my first “road race” in a long time at the Church Creek Time Trial instead of being race director as I have for the last 10 years.

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