NorCal Cycling News – Cycling and Racing in Northern California

I think Cyclocross Magazine is more obsessed about KCM than we are.  It makes me feel jilted, but Bikes To Rawanda is a great cause so check it out.

Katheryn Curi Mattis & Ritte’s Cyclocross Bikes by Josh Liberles

Katheryn Curi Mattis apparently has a hard time staying “retired” from competitive bike racing. Curi Mattis—who won the 2005 US road race national title and the 2008 Geelong World Cup road race, and is one of the top American roadies of the past decade—has lightened her racing load this year and transitioned to more of a mentoring role for developing athletes in the Webcor program. But her competitive itch coupled with Bikes to Rwanda’s humanitarian mission of providing cargo bikes to Rwandan coffee farmers conspired to get Curi Mattis on a ’cross bike for one of the country’s biggest events.

FULL ARTICLE HERE

Send me race reports from the weekend cross freaks and lonely road riders.  I have more Interbike videos for next week so hope to get more news up other than who came in second this weekend.

It’s great when promoters are willing to take a story to it’s logical conclusions.  Cannondale p/b Cyclocrossworld.com and Rapha-Focus dressed up their star riders Tim Johnson and Jeremy Powers for a boxing weigh in type of event that was culminated in a race on short stunt style indoor velodrome.  All i have to say is… it needed more glitter, and spotlights, and I wouldn’t have been upset if somebody took a swing

 

 

THE MAIN EVENT

Fort Ord
10 September 2011

Cyclocross season has begun…and now in the NCNCA with Saturday’s CCCX event at Fort Ord. The course was replete with everything needed for ‘cross racing except for the absence of rain and mud. It’s still September and dry and dusty were good enough.

The Elite Women’s race was contested between Devon Gory (Team Rambuski Law) and Stella Carey (HRS/Bay 101/Rocklobster) including some uncompromising defense of position by Gory. On an early lap, Carey made an attempt at the top of the hill to take over first place with Gory unwilling to yield and both racers then going side-by-side on single track. Gory went on to a narrow win over Carey, Katheryn Mattis (Webcor/Alto Velo) coming in third. Trina Baumsteiger (Team Rambuski Law) and Josie Jaques-Maynes (CalGiant) placing fourth and fifth, respectively.

The Elite Men’s race was more or less controlled by Andy Jacques-Maynes (Bissell Pro Cycling) for his dominant win. A battle for second took place later in the race between HRS/Bay 101/Rocklobster racers Scott Chapin and Aaron Bradford…Chapin finally taking the second step over his new teammate. Cody Kaiser (CalGiant/Specialized) and Burbank’s Chris Jackson (Team Rambuski Law) rounded put the five-place podium.

Next up for ‘cross racers is the Fosom Cyclebration (17 September) plus the season opener of the Sacramento Cyclocross Series at the Cyclery Compound on 24 September. The next CCCX at Fort Ord is 24 September.

This last weekend was a transition of sorts.  Cross, track, and crits all happening at the same time.

Sacramento Grand Prix

The exciting news is Mary Ellen Ash (Metromint) uncorked a big one (YEA!) to take the win at Projects Sport’s latest party for cyclists.   The bummer of it all is we got SoCal’d again by former US crit champion Rahsaan Bahati.  Podium Insight covered the action and has a great article up on the event

CCCX #1

Pro’s Andy Jacques Maynes (Bissell) and Devon Gorry (Rambuski Law) showed up to the first race of the season and used their road fitness to teach the early season hopefuls a think or two about how to prepare for early season cross.  The trick is apparently ride a lot of stage races…

Randoms

UCI Criterium Rule Changes

Looks like the UCI will start allowing criteriums in 2.2 stage races which could mean and upgrade for the big US events like Cascade, Mt. Hood, and Nature Valley Grand Prix.  While this is a great start, and will surely help move the needle on getting more UCI events in the US, there are some financial hurdles that will limit promoters like waving registration fee’s and providing housing allowances.   Still… at least it’s a possibility now so events like Utah can raise some more money and stay in business.  See full story on Cyclingnews.com

Single Speed World Championships

This freak show is going to be in Golden Gate Park.  What do you get when you mix Folsom St. Fair with a cross race?  You get The SSCXWC!

Best Press Release Ever

Sterling Cross, run my local coach Matt McNamara sent out a release with their cross roster.  It is well written and a nice write up but i gotta call out this great Rand Miller gem…I really wish he, Rand, was riding Cross Vegas.  That would be fun.

…the mens team includes talent and depth in the form of standout road riders Adam Carr and Rand Miller, both of whom made successful transitions to ‘cross last fall and look to be even stronger this season.

I love Las Vegas.  I love cyclocross.  It is only natural that the two get together making a combination that has not been topped since Oscar met Mayer and invented baloney.  It is happening on September 14th. Mark your calendars.

Cross Vegas is happening this year, which looked iffy for a while when Interbike announced their ill-fated plans to move the trade show portion of Cross Vegas, cleverly named Interbike by the Interbike Co., to Anaheim or some other god forsake spot in SoCal.  First of all stupid idea.  Second of all, thank god you came to your senses Interbike Co., cause if Cross Vegas didn’t happen I never would have forgiven you… ever.  The beauty is tickets are five bucks, you gotta support the endeavor, but you do need to sort out transportation, which I might add, has been getting better each year, so you do not have to worry about getting stranded… which happend to me one year, and even though I ended up hanging out in a bar with a bunch of locals, I got a bunch of  tips which came in handy later in the night but that’s another story.

Why is Cross Vegas so great?  Well – it draws the best cross talent in the US, and is starting to draw a bunch of the Euro racers out of that backward sub-continent that unfortunately is the birth of all things cycling. In addition they have gone to great lengths to make the women’s event as exciting and as lucrative as the men’s event.  Crank Brothers is using the event as a launching pad for their new women’s cx team and their support has enabled the event to take a new level.

“What a perfect way to support women’s racing,” CrossVegas Director Brook Watts commented, “equal prizes for the Top 5 places shows the efforts that cyclocross is taking to bridge the gender gap.  Crankbrothers understands that and turns it into a fun promotional opportunity.”

In addition to Crank Brother support NorCal favorite Clif Bar has stepped up as title sponsor which is typical in their ability to snif out the cool stuff before other folks.  In addition to helping the event grow Clif Bar will be taking some of the goodies they distribute on the floor of Interbike out to the fields where the cross race is running.

CLIF BAR’s increased participation will provide greater on-site activities for staff and guests as well as increased visibility across all promotional materials, including national advertising. In addition, the full range of CLIF energy foods and drinks will be sampled to spectators on-site.

I don’t want you to walk away and think this is all a shill for the race.  Well it is.. but I got plans, big plans. First of all, Hernando was spotted at one of the early CX races, it would be great to get him out there again. Doesn’t it look like he was having fun?

Second of all… it’s the spot of my biggest YouTube hit which you can see below.  Katheryn Curi Mattis is looking at riding the race and I’m currently mulling over my heckling costume so I can cheer her comeback on in style.  I’m thinking we need a NorCal theme if we are going to heckle our locals.  Think it over… if you are going we can coordinate.  Also… don’t be shy about giving my YouTube hit a thumbs up… I think Lance personally is trying to vote it down.