Gravel might be the new cross as far as the marketing departments are concerned, but as an event? Nah.
Cross is still probably the most family friendly cycling event. It’s really the only off-road cycling discipline that’s easy to take the family to and allows for easy spectating.
I agree! The spectating is always one of my favorite parts about racing. I think with anything it just depends on the area. The scene seems to be dwindling around southwest Virginia at least. Dccx had a great turnout a couple weeks ago.
Not sure if gravel is especially to blame for it. There aren’t really many gravel races here in the UK, but all type of cycling events are down in numbers, road, crits, TTs, even hill climbs.
CX is on life support in Colorado. There is one main USAC sanctioned events and they are all in the Denver/Boulder area. Quite a bit of unsanctioned stuff in GJ, southern CO and such, but yeah it is probably running on empty. We had maybe 400-some racers this past weekend when before Covid, well, I think 2017/2018 was the high point here with 600-800 racers at an event. Every weekend had two CX races from September to January.
People, myself included, are just over CX. Colorado and I’m sure other states, there is just too much other things to do on the weekends than go race for 45 minutes. This is prime time for mountain biking as the dirt is typically the best, amazing fall colors, and great temps.
Plus gravel races are creeping up from September to mid October and we usually get over 1,000 per gravel race.
Hate to say it, but I completely agree on CX dying. We only have a few local events this year, with many of the double headers deciding to go down to one day of racing. The top local racers are pushing for less USAC racing so they don’t lose call up positions at the national events, which is awful for the rest of us who can no longer gain upgrade points for big events. Pretty demoralizing to grid up 40-50th for your A race of the year because you do not have any local opportunity to gain points.
As someone who is a die hard CX racer, I think this may be the last season I take seriously and look towards mountain bike racing that seems to be making a comeback locally.
That’s good to hear. I’m hoping that trend will continue
That’s rough. It seems very regionalized from the responses. Locally we almost had our Wednesday night cx series canceled but thankfully the organizers put together a subscription model with a financial target - the community came together pretty quickly to fund it. So hopefully cx will continue and grow here but we’ll see.
First CX of the year was last night, 2 weeks in hawaii with no bike time there, then returning last saturday at noon was not optimal prep, lining up on the second row of the elite field was a poor choice and 90F heat was not handled well.
Still beat 1/4 of the field after pulling the pin 35 minutes in.
Not a fan of the 38mm terreno zeros, just no faith in them until they roll all the way over.
This is my first season of cyclocross and I have heard of many people adding run and strength workouts into their weekly plan. What do you all do? Right now, LV and a skills workout is what I can consistently accomplish. Should I start to incorporate runs or strength workouts in the middle of race season, or work on that for next year?
If you’re racing every weekend I don’t think I’d add any new training stimulus to the mix right now. Maybe if you have an off weekend do a short easy run and some pushups. I’ve been doing some runs and strength training weekly for two years now and my body is adapted to it. If you haven’t run in a while, you will notice your heart rate will seem really high for the effort.
Those are great ideas. Thank you. I am noticing the leg fatigue more and more especially with all of the VO2max workouts, so recovery is definitely becoming more of a priority
Right now my races are every other weekend, but will then become every weekend in October. I will try some bodyweight exercises like push-ups and see how my body feels. Maybe a short run if I must lol
Rochester CX weekend. I raced the 4/5 bright and early at 8:40AM. Course was wet and slick with the morning dew. Di2 went haywire and I started the start sprint finding out that the rear derailleur wouldn’t shift, so I was effectively racing single speed. Hit 159 for a max cadence. Forced me to conserve momentum but really limited my power output on the fast flat areas because of the gear I got stuck in. Ended up 10th out of 40. I think the SS smoothed out my power a bit as well; 277 NP, 231 Avg P.
Day 2 went a little better. Got rain at the start and throughout the race so it was a completely different course than the day before, plus half was ridden in the opposite direction. Slightly more rideable in this direction even in the mud. But the mud changed a usually rideable uphill into a slippy, slidy mess. Could have used the toe spikes. Crashed a couple times and broke a BOA on my shoe so the run up was interesting. But I was able to fix my Di2 issue (bad cable) so I could shift again. Finished 8th out of 30 so slightly better result but didn’t feel as good as the day prior, power was down as well. 257 NP, 205 avg P. I think my recovery after day 1 could have been better, but I wanted to hang out and watch the pro races so was on my feet more than usual.
Looking like Charm City could be mud fest, thanks to Hurricane Ian. Will be interesting to see how this goes!
Interestingly, Ive head a ton of people having Di2 issues this season! My buddy was so stoked that he was finally able to bunny hop the barriers, only to find out that the not so delicate landing appeared to put him into crash mode. Was able to sort it out but odd to say the least!
@IvyAudrain doing fun stuff at Rochester
The first lap, most of us did that accidentally/unable to run down because it was SO slick, so from there on we just decided it was more efficient to just go for the slide. 
Nice work!! This is a great start to the season for sure! 
& thanks for the cheers!
I’m curious how people deal with expectations and call ups. I’m relatively new and do cross mostly for fun after a long gravel season, but I enjoy the idea of trying to at least be competitive in the Cat 4 races I do.
However, due to other commitments I can only do a few races a season so my call up is usually near the back of the pack. I find I’m able to move up pretty well during the race and am limited by fitness and skills after a certain amount of the race, but it also doesn’t really feel possible to get to the front of the race when starting so far back.
Do I need to go out harder at the start to try and get around more people before the traffic jams start and just risk blowing up? Just deal with it and enjoy the races for what they are?
I have a gravel bike, and want to do a couple of local cx races in the Sacramento area in November/December. I understand the courses have grass (and it’ll probably be wet and a little muddy, but probably nothing crazy). My tires for gravel have no grip, so I’m thinking a set of tires for cross is in order.
Thanks
