Georgia Cross Race 2 Savannah 10-19-08

Today's race course was awesome. It had some super fun technical sections including a fly-over, an unrideable pit of clay mud and some woop dee woos. The mostly flat course did not suit my strengths but I thoroughly enjoyed riding it.
There appeared to be about 25 guys in the race and the course started with a long dirt car track section that was perfect for establishing an order into the first turn. I made a mistake early in the race by going out too slow. After the start lap I was in 15th place and feeling too relaxed for a cross race. My pace felt more like a group ride and less like a race. I lost some time every lap through a rooty tree section that was full of sharp turns. Those types of sections continue to be my weakness. I was able to make up ground on the straight aways and grassy field areas. I was in a group of about 4 riders (Green jersey guy, 2 red jersey guys on the same team and me)and we continued to attack each other for almost the entire ride. We passed a few guys and with about 6 laps to go the guy in a green jersey got away. So then we were three. Two red jersey team mates and me. The two team mates were able to drop me so I ended up riding most of the last 5 laps solo. With three laps to go I had enough left in the tank to increase the pace. I made up ground on the two team mates. As I came into the grassy field area before the start finish line on the last lap, I noticed the guy in green was back with the two red team mates and they were dropping the guy in green. I quickly made my way up to and then passed the guy in green as well. Shortly after that the two red team mates split up. I was able to catch and pass the slower of the two team mates but the other one got away. I finished in 12th place. My lesson learned was to not go out too slow and leave such a huge gap to make up in the end. I am now going to take a few days off the bike to recover. I will do some recovery yoga today. Tomorrow I will do the aero ab-blaster, fix the back- strength and stretch and by Wednesday I should be ready to increase the intensity. Later in the week, I will work on my work on my cornering skills in the rooty tree sections.