National Champions and a 13 Year-Old Girl

Marisa Peacock
11.06.05

In retrospect, I think I was a little over confident. What could the Virginia Cyclocross Series throw at me that I hadn’t survived already in the MABRA series? I’ve raced against the who’s who of cyclocross women. Women who I’d followed for sometime and looked up to and sought guidance from: the Melanie Swartzs, Heidi Von Teitenbergs, Sami Fourniers and Beth Masons. In my small corner of the Mid Atlantic cross world, could it get any tougher? It’s probably a question I should have never asked.

Nate and I arrived at Panorama Farms in Charlottesville, VA on a beautiful and sunny Sunday, well ahead of schedule. With two hours to prepare for my 1:30pm race, I confidently warmed up, hydrated, ate and rode the course. Unlike Panorama courses of years before, this year’s course cut out the quarry section, the hilly backwoods and the barriers on the flat section by the backhoe. Instead, the course was more like a corn maze, but without the corn. Lacking the usual red and yellow tape that decorates many a cyclocross course, a long curly path was simply mowed down and around hay bales.

During my warm-up, I tried to remain elusive. Hidden in the shade on my trainer, I listened in on neighboring conversations. The juniors next to me were gearing up for their first-ever A races, including Hollis Owens, a 13 year-old wunderkind. As I fixated on her youth, I overheard the emcee announce the presence of the female NORBA short-track champion, Susan Haywood. She was racing in the Men’s B category and holding off the boys behind her quite well; very well for her very first cyclocross race. I rolled my eyes. I had no sympathy for her third place finish. Then they announced that she’d also be racing in the Women’s A race. Great.

The previous day at the Head of the Occoquan, the last regatta of the fall season, my lightweight scullers had bemoaned the presence of a US Rowing National team member in their race. Having just returned from Worlds, she figured a head race in Northern Virginia would serve as a nice cool down. She won the race, but not the hearts of her competitors. I was beginning to feel their pain. Though Nate thought it was cool that I’d get to race with a National champion, I thought otherwise.

On the start line, the whistle blew and I failed to clip into my right pedal right away. As I struggled I bumped the wheel of the National champion and nearly took her down. Being a short-track champion, I hoped she was used to that sort of thing. Before I had time to feel badly, I noticed that I was trailing behind considerably. As I came around the hale bales, I caught a rider and flew ahead. I was actually going at a pretty good speed, but was still behind the group. This was not going according to plan. I don’t usually have to fight this early in the race, but I was fighting hard. The rolling hills allowed me to make up time on the descents, but made it painful on the climbs. I couldn’t figure the best way to get up them without putting up some sort of struggle. They weren’t steep enough to run up, but were long enough that shifting was required. If I shifted down too early, I lost all leverage and if I shifted down in the middle of the climb, I lost momentum. Each lap I tried something different, and every lap I struggled more and more. (If anyone has suggestions, I'm open!)

Like my previous race at Michaux State Forest, the barriers were again strategically placed on uphill, but unlike Iron Cross Lite, they were right before the finish, rather than at the beginning of each lap. I debated in my head which was crueler. I kept at it and the lactic acid in my legs burned. A cramp in my calf, a product of wearing heels for twelve hours on Friday, made itself known each time I stood up on the climbs. Sometime during my second lap I was passed by the rider I had managed to squeak by at the start. I didn’t offer much of a fight. After four laps,I finished the race in last place and far from the happy place I’d been in at the end of previous races.

I had underestimated the Virginia Cyclocross Series. Despite its step-sister image to the MABRA series and the unexplained absence of Pamela Zimmerman and Susan Revere, who dominated the Women’s’ A and B races last year, there was quite a lot of talent represented on the line. In the end, I had lost to two National Champions, as it turns out Hollis Owens won junior Nationals last year.

See you next week at Race Pace Cross (MABRA #6) in Sykesville, MD.