Barton Park

Cross Crusade #5
Barton Park
Clackamas, Oregon
November 5th, 2006

Remember, Remember the 5th of November (V For Vendetta)

Barton Park (actually a Clackamas County gravel quarry) welcomed the 5th Cross Crusade race in the Cross Crusade Series (this coming weekend is the 6th & Final in the series). After 3 days of HEAVY rain, Barton Park was an absolute mess (perfect 'cross weather).

This was an interesting race as it was the first race of the series that had callups (basically they call the top 10 racers in the series and put them out in front) I was called up in the 4th position, so at least going into the season I was in 4th place)

Start of the race - that's me, 4th from the lead

So, that at least started me in a good position, unfortunately, I pulled a total rookie and couldn't get my foot clipped in (a problem that plagued me through out the race). When I finally clipped in, I was down in about 12th place. I quickly sprinted as close to the front as I could and entering the tricky bits I was in around 5th place. Through out the first two laps I managed to move up to about 3rd place and was hoping to move up further - Unfortunately after a runup, I (once again) had problems clipping in. As I struggled I took a wide corner and hit a hub deep puddle of mud, went over the bars and managed to jam a ton of soupy mud/dirt into my right side STI shifter. After frantically picking out mud (to disengage my rear brake) I was back in the race - now holding about 5th place. Unfortunately, the dirt in my STI prevented me from shifting out of the low gear I had been in, so the anytime there was a long straightaway, I was spinning like mad to keep up.


I held on as much as possible and finished the race in 7th place. Not bad all things considered.

btw: All of you out there that have kids, my wonderful wife Megan is an RD - Check out her new website: www.dietakids.com