wanders

I went out to watch some collegiate racing at Dixie Classic today. Got to see ilpirata87 and met snuff. I tried to capture what is the essence of Dixie. These are from the A race.

I'm no ed.

wanders

Not sure if the cones are to alert the riders to hazards or filter them into them.

MDcatV

tour du parking lot?

wanders

Pretty much.

CaseLawZ28

I hate Dixie.

ZeCanon

wow that looks like teh suck

Frunkin

I'm driving 8 hours this weekend for a parking lot crit and a RR. Yay college racing!

ilpirata87

Hey thanks for posting those pictures. Teh suck doesn't begin to describe it. Utterly exposed to gusting headwinds along the 300-meter finishing stretch = difficult for a 135-lb dude like me to put out enough power to keep up. Especially when the pack gets blown apart by a huge wreck (snuff was involved, he can tell you about it) and the race is basically a 60-minute clusterf__k with tons of small groups passing each other. At least snuff and I finished!

aicabsolut

I skipped that race this year. Man, I hate that track, even though I'm pretty strong on flat, windy roads.

Nice pics, though.

I heard it was snowing in the morning? We had a guys down there for the D and C race, but they bailed on account of the weather after they heard how badly the course sucks anyway.

Snuffleupagus

Thanks for the pics, and good to meet you wanders!

As for the track...yeah, it does kinda suckish, but it's honestly much worse looking than it is to ride. I ended up going down in the big pile up, but wasn't too much the worse for wear, just the standard road rash on the hip and forearm. I felt okay during the race, as one might expect as a hellaciously windy, dead flat course kinda favors a w/CdA guy like me.

currand

The essence of Dixie is not sliding out around that last curve at 35mph and not endo-ing over that metal thing in the chicane. That's not a track, its an obstacle course!

Of course, I might just be pissy 'cause I got schooled there last year.

Snuffleupagus

Hm, so I ended up 11th and Q 16th.

Better than a kick in the teeth I 'spose. Although the road rash is now in the "really fricking annoying" phase of healing.

Flatballer

Judging by the fun it sounds like was had, I'm not feeling so bad for skipping it.

My teammate (Walker Owen) won the C race. This is his first season, and he's gonna be a B soon probably. Already two top 3s, just needs one more.

Who is going to Navy this weekend? I'm looking forward to it, since it's before my Spring Break, so I don't have to think about anything, I can just ride and have fun.

acorn_user

Upgrading to B is based on experience, not results. So he only needs one more if that gets him 10 races so he can move from 5 to 4. B is for cat 4s and 3s (I am racing B this year even though I didn't get any results in 4, 5, or C races last year because I am a 4).

I want to go to Navy. I might not be able to. We'll see. I've heard lots about the crit but I have never ridden it.

Flatballer

I thought they still auto-upgraded you from C to B if you got 3 top 3s?

If not, he's got a little ways to go. I think he has 6 mass starts (same as me, just a slightly different 6). Would only be two weekends, except both Navy and W&M have TT for one of the days.

aicabsolut

The Navy crit is well suited to my style of racing so long as I keep fighting to lead into that one crazy turn. But I'm still dreading it. I hate that turn. And it's always freezing and crazily windy out there.

runtimmyc

The rules are that you have to be a Cat 4 or Cat 3 to be racing Collegiate B's. Once he upgrades to Cat 4 then he can upgrade to Collegiate B's.

... I would be going to Navy, but I just got all the parts to my TT bike and won't have a chance to ride it this week. Going so far just for a crit is not in the cards this semester.

aicabsolut

Why not just do the TT on the other bike?

runtimmyc

Basically, to place high in the A field I would need all the help I can get. Racing my road bike with clip-ons would place me pretty low even if I was crushing it. Hopefully by William and Mary I'll have everything set up and be competitive with JFlo and the Navy guys.

...plus there are two road races in Greenville...

aicabsolut

gotcha. weather.com is saying it might snow anyway. super!

Snuffleupagus

3 midterms, 2 papers and a lab report next week.

See you guys some other race

acorn_user

If I don't get too many revisions on my dissertation proposal tomorrow, I'll be at Navy. I'm looking forward to it as I've never raced it before, even though this is my third season. I'm not really expecting to do well. Talk about the wrong bike; I'll be riding my cross bike again for both events! So longs as I don't spin out on my 48-13....

enjoi

i'll be at navy doing the B race on both days.
I'm looking forward to the food in Annapolis, highlight of the race last year.

aicabsolut

I had a horrible week this week after being sick last week. I don't have the requisite suffering capacity for this weekend, even though it's a race weekend pretty suited to my style. I'm going to try to finally get rid of this lung gunk I picked up after NCSU.

One of my bosses at my internship said I need to go eat crabcakes at some hotel in Annapolis. Maybe another time.