Lina's Coyote Point Race Report

Our newest rider Lina files this report from her very firstest cross race:

hat was AWESOME. my first cx race. my 4th or so time riding on dirt.
(east bayway doesn't count.) i don't even have a bike yet, but Ariel
let me use his! (thanks Ariel!)

i was recruited to the sheila moon team shortly before the race - i
believe the official approval of my joining the team was a text
message reading "crush bitches!". being on the sheila moon team means
being donned up in the hottest attire!

so in a pink skinsuit i lined up at the start line and off we went. up
some hill, ride ride ride, oh this is going fine, i'm hanging onto the
front so far despite riding on dirt, ride ride ride, hop off the bike!
carry it over the barriers, ride... no ride? DAMMIT! the chain fell
off! fiddle fiddle fiddle, oh crap, like half of the field rode past
me... it took me a good half or whole minute to get that back on. i'd
practiced remounts the day before but despite this fine practice i
still didn't do a single proper remount during the race, so that
didn't help - next time i'll practice getting the chain back on
instead! :P

alright, ride ride ride, uh-oh, get off, run up a hill, fail at
remounting again, ride! sand! run run run, ungracefully hop back on,
then some descent with roots and shit but hey! the girl who's scared
of dirt can actually deal with this, as it turns out.



uh-oh, some little boy falls right in front of me, no space left,
CRASH! haha, falling on grass doesn't hurt! ok WOW this is awesome but
is it gonna end soon? ok, passed some more people but still not nearly
as many as passed me while i was fiddling with the chain, ride over
the roots again, hey, this is going alright! whooooa totally losing my
balance, will fall, oh what happened, i'm still upright, figuring out
i have better balance than i think is great!

ok, ride ride ride, hey there's mariska on a mountain bike yelling her
race is all about beating ME! that's what i get for heckling her
during the cx class we took a month back. alright, some more riding,
some more falling, haha, falling doesn't hurt at all! but dammit,
mariska got ahead when i fell, alright, but gnat isn't going to beat
me! ride run ride ride ride RUN ride ride FINISH! 30 minutes later
with an average HR at 91% of my max.

and then beer with my new team followed. sweet! spent the rest of the
day drinking beer, watching the other races, cheering and heckling.
feeding beer to the racers. oh and some water too.

so, everyone should do cyclocross. it's fucking awesome and insane
amounts of fun.