Ashland Baycross Part I

Anybody looking for a great cross race weekend to put on your calendar seriously consider the Ashland Baycross races! Fantastic courses with good variety & put together in a top notch way. I may be from around the area but I was seriously impressed with the quality and work put into them and the great environment of the events. The settings for both couldn’t be better, with the Sunday event overlooking the shores of Lake Superior and the Saturday event held at one of Ashland’s oldest parks that offers great variety.

Saturday 18th: Baycross #1 – with Kate’s family in town she got the opportunity to partake in her first race in…..well…. quite a while. Having three baby’s in the course of 4 years puts a crimp in your racing schedule. But she did us all proud giving it a go in the B race despite having just given birth 3 weeks ago to our wonderful baby girl, Grace on Sept 26th.
As she was wrapping up that race I was prepping for the A race in what appeared to be a nice strong field of racers that showed up. I was however sorely disappointed to see that a favorite hard core racer, Duluthian, Charlie Farrow was no where to be found however (camping in the Porcupine Mts or something was his story I guess). He put on a heck of a strong race last year and I was hoping for a rematch.
I placed my bike way out front for the lemonds start so I didn’t get caught behind anyone as I was fairly certain from other events like this that my legs are in alittle better condition for sprint running that most cyclists. To my bike first, but late to clip in I grab the fourth position in the leadout train behind, Craig Kalscheur, Scott Chapin & Shawn Gort. Craig was hell bent on a fast start and it strung people out. When we hit the railroad corridor section a half mile in and a gap of a few bike lengths had seemingly extended to Bay City cyclists Kelly Mcknight & Matt Hudson. After Craig pulled off, Scottie took over and I/we probably made a critical error at that point, handing him a 20 yard lead and not closing it down. I figured if the three of us could back off alittle but keep it together and rotate through we’d have a better shot. Only thing was Shawn surprisingly dropped off before the end of the first lap when I was pulling and Craig was over the limit early in Lap 2. And Scottie now had a 15 second lead I’d be trying to chase down all day…. Only now by myself. So much for that brilliant opening lap strategy. If I’d only stuck with him instead. I think the closest count I could make was getting his lead down to seven seconds at some mid point in the race but by the final 15 minutes I was getting toasty from chasing and the unfamiliar all out effort and he was up by 45seconds to a minute.
That however didn’t make for a boring race by any means because for some crazy reason I still shake my head about, Shawn Gort comes storming back into my rearview mirror after I’d thought he’d been dropped out of sight. I shouldn’t be surprise because he did the exact same thing last year, dropping off early only to finally warm up and get all the cyclinders firing later and pour it on. I’d messed up the lap count and was expecting a bell lap when .....the official announced two laps to go, that with an overly rough remount had me off the bike fixing my saddle that was pointing to heaven – hence enabling Shawn to close the gap entirely.
It was now that I was really out of gas and on the edge of cramping so I just stuck to Shawns wheel as best as I could, if he’d only know how spent I was he could have ditched me with 3 or 4 hard efforts. I followed him around that next to last lap and on the bell lap I did the same. At one point trying to get to the front but the single track didn’t do make way for any kind of passing. Here I was at odds with how to finish, I generally hate sucking someone’s wheel and with Shawn doing all the hard work at the end it was going to be hard to try and take it away from him. But with about 100yards to go on this old railroad grade finish he made a strong move to pass a lap racer, I was tentative at first but soon shot around to follow and start to close the gap. From there the corridor opened up and the people and fans were getting loud seeing this close finish coming on. I figured to push and make for a good show and a tight finish so went to the left and pulled near even with Shawn. As we were nearing the chute I put my hand on his back to push him across first, but my momentum still had me carrying past him, so I hit my brakes putting in a skid 3 or 4 yards before the finish. We crossed the line pretty near simultaneously, not to the delight of the Liphart Brother race officials who weren’t too anxious about trying to make that close of call. When I looked down as we crossed I’d assumed he’d crossed about an inch in front me. But neither of us bothered to check with the officials who had actually crossed first. I assumed he had and I think he probably assumed the same. However when they did the awards later, they ruled I’d crossed first?! Wow, what a surprise to me. Who would have thought pushing someone in the back and hitting your brakes ain’t enough to lose a sprint to the finish line? I felt bad for Shawn but it was nice to get second place again after a disappointing 5th place finish at last years BayCross.
The rest of the afternoon was a great time, playing with the kids at the park and also getting to visit and catch up with everyone.
Paul Belknap, Sara Hudson & their crew (of the McKnights, Klines, Lipharts and more) put on one of the best races I’d ever been at. Little did I know that the next day they’d at least equal or top Day 1 of Baycross…. More later.