Race Report: NCC Hydra Cross
Hydra was the perfect race to finally rip the ‘cross band-aid off and start the season!
The long weekend started off for me with a few TBD and Kruis friends up in the Catskills. We met up to do a mini ‘cross training camp before the official/unofficial start of the local season at Bubble Cross. The weekend included a shake out ride on Friday, a longer endurance ride ft. a few enduro segments on Saturday, and another endurance ride on Sunday with skills practice in a field. I only came for part of the weekend, as I was itching to start racing after not having much of a road season. Saturday’s ride gave me just enough TSS in the legs to simulate a double race weekend and being closer to Holyoke meant that I would accumulate less driving TSS before the race. With a long season ahead, minimizing travel fatigue is a priority for me.
The weather forecast held true and it was a dry, dusty, and sunny day. I got to Pulaski Park just in time to do two pre-rides where I tried to focus on a few specific sections: the off-camber turns near the south pole of the park, the downhill turns after the first punchy climb, and the turn around the pine trees at the end of the course. Considering it was such a dry course, I knew that the race was going to be fast and that these tricky sections were going to have speed limits.
With 45 minutes to race-start, I set up my trainer next to the course for my warm-up and channeled my anxiety into cheering on the Junior races. Some say “Cross is dead,” yeah right! Tell that to the 54 junior racers that whizzed by me (not to mention the total of over 250 racers that showed up)! Cross is alive and always welcome to new folks!
The ‘cross gods blessed me with a second row call-up in the men’s 3/4 field. Whistle blew, right shoe clicked in (phew), and off we went towards the first corner. I entered it in 11th wheel and basically held that position for most of the race. As Colin Reuter put it before the race, “get ready to pedal as hard as you can in the two sections where it’s possible.” It was so hard to pass people in the twists and turns and you had only a few sections where you could lay down power to get in front of people. A few crashes splintered the field early and it became a game of group racing pretty much from the first lap.
I felt like I rode the final, rooty corner every possible way during my seven laps. If there was traffic, running was definitely the answer otherwise you risked getting pushed down the off-camber. If you were leading a group or by yourself, then setting up for the high line was your shortest and fastest route as long as you could stay up. Scootering saved several wheels throughout the day.
The heat cooked me by lap five and I started making silly mistakes. Despite pre-riding the off-camber turns and twisty downhill, I managed to over cook these sections a couple of times. Some front wheel washouts caused me to loose positions that I had worked to make up earlier in the race. I ultimately crossed the finish in 12th place feeling like I had smoked a pack of cigarettes from all the dust. Que the ‘cross cough.
I’m stoked with the effort I was able to put out and grateful for the course’s proper reminder of how to (and how not to) take turns. I thankfully did not suffer from the same heat exhaustion symptoms I experienced in 2023, so I’ll take that as a win. This was the race to shake the pre-season jitters, test out the race day routine, and see where the legs are. Some things need tweaking and there’s a long season ahead of us, but I’m excited about what’s to come!
