2011-->2012 the year in CX and stuff

The 2011/2012 CX season can be searched for in the RAM of my mind by a few key words.

1) muddy.


2) sweet artsy photos.
3) hardware and/or Worlds.

Without being (or consulting) a weather historian, I feel safe saying this is the wettest/muddiest season the OVCX has ever seen. 2010 was undoubtedly the driest/dustiest, and though not EVERY race this year was muddy, I did get pretty good at pre-laundering my cycling clothing outside with the hose. Not to mention having to deal with three bikes (my A, my B and Lindsay's) nearly every week. The kind of "dirty" they were getting requires more than just superficial cleaning. It took a lot of time. Also the way the weather has been lately more mud is on tap if you're not on the roads. And even still you're going to get messy just from wet nastiness. I feel like The Mudfather: every time I try to get out, it pulls me back in.
Also this year saw about every other person at any given race w/ a camera. This made for a crap-load of photos and most people gave them away for free download as well. Some even have a keen enough eye (and fast enough shutter) to catch killer shots like the one above. So thanks to them, I won't forget the 2011/2012 season until my hard drive crashes and the data is irretrievable.
Finally: hardware. Going into the state championship I liked my chance for gold or at least silver. After finding out Eric Anderson is a Cat II, I liked my chance for silver, maybe bronze. I brought home bronze. Not exactly what I wanted, but at least I have more crap to hang on my wall. Worlds. See previous post. I'm still not happy with Worlds a week later. Blah.
As for my overall season, I was a little behind were I wanted to be. The structure change of the Elite class made more of a difference on the top of the results sheet than I had anticipated. And though I worked hard throughout the season, I learned a lesson and will do my homework for next year. But that's many months off. We need to get to and through the Spring/Summer first. Not that I normally do a ton of rad racing anyway, but this year looks even thinner than normal in terms of a road race schedule (and it's usually pretty thin anyway). I'm hoping to get in a couple RR's, but honestly right now it's not looking like there is going to be much offered. Good news is there are two full MTB series' up and there should be a good run of TT's to do. Every year I say to myself 'maybe I'll jump into some crits again this year' and every year I don't. But who knows, maybe I'll jump into some crits again this year. I mean, when I last did crit races I was new to cycle racing and just didn't like the style of racing. But I'm a lot more experienced no and a lot better cyclist. I still probably won't though.
Let's go get 2012!