Cincinatti UCI Weekend

This weekend was the UCI three race weekend. We left Friday morning to get to my 1:30pm start. Forecast was for rain and it rained the whole way there. Pretty hard. And it had rained the entire day before. Needless to say the course was a muddy mess. Large portions of it were unrideable and we were told that large portions had to be re-routed to not completely destroy the park grounds. Friday was, without a doubt, the muddiest cross race I've ever done.
I had a good start and entered the course from the pavement ~5th or so. I rode at the front for a lot of the race, but after a while I had to just focus on not falling (which was not really possible) and keep moving forward in the deep, sticky mud.
I ended up 11th on the day. (it's worth noting that at these big UCI races, they run cat 2 and 3 in the same race, whereas "normally" the cat 2's race w/ the cat 1/2. So my 11th was overall, including cat2's.) So I was happy w/ that result.
My happiness is evident by my big smile, while completely covered head to toe in mud (photo G. Parry).

We stayed at the host hotel, which was a Radisson. They had a "wash station" (hose) set up in the parking garage, which was totally sweet. I brought my cleaning supplies and work stand, so I had it dialed.
We were on the 15th floor of this 18 floor hotel. Here are couple shots of the surrounding trees/hills/interstates from our balcony.

and this cool bell tower below.

Saturday's race was expected to be much better weather-wise (it couldn't really be worse). And while it had a couple muddy patches in the course, overall it was a great course. I really liked it and would really like to do it in ideal conditions; I think it would be super fast. I didn't know my start time while I was messing around during the other races, so I didn't eat what I normally do before racing and I had a shorter warm up than normal too. I still rode good and hard, though I felt a little flat. I ended up 12th.
Sunday was the race that I have done several times in the past. The course changes a bit year to year, but I generally know it. Plus I showed up early enough o ride 4 laps for pre-ride. The course was pretty fast overall, and dry for the most part, but did have a few "mud pits" as they were being called. It also had two sand pits (as did the previous day). This is of note because the sand, plus all the wet plus just general dirtiness, had my brake pads wore to next to nothing. I was a little worried going in that my brakes would fade from still-kinda-working status to sorry-dude status in the duration. I took off and had another great start. I rolled a good portion of the race in 4th and was eventually caught by a group of chasers. I sat in the group, which started to splinter w/ me toward the back. I attacked out of it and ended up 7th. I was very happy w/ that result and the race overall. I need new pads though.
Big props to Ryan Knapp and Mike Sherer for showing big time in the Pro races all three days. I left before the end of Sunday's race, but I guess they both crashed and both broke a collar bone each! The both had good races all three days and were mixing it up w/ the big pro guys. Bummer they crashed out on the last day.
Props to Fred Rose for bringing it in the Masters race all three days.
BIG props top Eric Hamilton for starting form the back of the 2/3 (my race) and winning Sat and Sun. This guy is a cross machine. he's new to the discipline and reminds me of James Stewart in his early motocross days: super fast, but out of control. he's getting it down though. Look out for him in the 1-2 races here coming up.
And a huge shout out/thanks to Gerraint Parry, the hardest working man out there all weekend. GP announced all three days, and every race. That's like, 10 races per day between all cats, age groups and sexes. He always keeps a keen eye for his locals and makes sure they get their shout outs. Thanks G.

I'll post up some more pics as they are available..I'm sure there's more out there.