All Kris Crossed Up

Damn, it’s like summer vacation after your first year in college, when you leave the dorms and all those cool people you thought you knew, all the parties, all the girls, all the fun, and return back to your moms house and that pathetic fast-food job for the summer.  One day the sky is the limit, opportunity abounds, new faces and new places are a daily ritual, spring is in the air, girls wear less clothes, excuses for skipping class become easier to come by; the next you’re flipping burgers and wondering where all you’re high school girlfriends ran off to (or with).   

Well these days have been feeling eerily similar.  The mountain bike race season is over – that is, if you insist on living next to mountains that receive copious amounts of snow – and I’ve been having some withdrawal.  Other people, with more talent or money or sponsors or a combination thereof, are still racing, and happy to fill my Facebook and twitter feeds with their wonderful experiences.  I crave the sport now more than ever, and am getting anxious and weary about the prospect of it all being over until late next spring.  Luckily, there seems to be a saving grace: cyclocross season.  Like that motorcycle you bought just to get you through the doldrums of a hot summer at home, which gave life a new meaning, and freedom a new home with you, cyclocross might just be that new drug I’ve been looking for.  Or, I could just be horribly jumping the gun here.  They call it Cross.  

Not to be confused with my heroes of old:

 I’ve never done a cyclocross race.  I don’t own a cyclocross bike.  In fact, I don’t own anything with skinny tires that actually fits me or I enjoy riding that much.  I’ll tell you what I know about cyclocross:  You race a road bike with knobby tires in the grass, pavement, dirt, sand, and mud.  Make sense? I didn’t think so.  But somehow this awkward mix of mountain biking and road biking has grown into one of the biggest racing scenes and niche equipment markets in the world.  So as part of my recovery from race addiction I think I’ll give it a shot.  The goods: there are races on the Front Range every weekend until January or so, the support network for these events is huge, it should keep me in good shape, everyone agrees at how much fun they are, and there will be beer.  The bads: I don’t own a CX bike, and in doing so my mountain bike budget, hence building a race-worthy bike for next year, will dwindle drastically.  There is also the prospect that I will suck at it.  Sounds like the goods outweigh the bads.  Count me in.  Next step, find a bike.

Last weeks race in Fort Collins.  Ok, that looks like more fun than road riding.

Oh, my buddy at Virtuous Cycles sells Kona, who make the Jake the Snake cross bike?  Hmmm, sounds tasty.