The photo says it all, I raced my ass off this weekend. The Crank Brothers US Grand Prix of cyclocross started off in Portland with a bang!

Take a look at this sweet race report from Jonathan Maus of BikePortland.org!

The race on Saturday was hard, muddy and required a fair amount of finesse. I have always had a hard race at Alpenrose. Though, 4 years ago I entered and won my first cross race ever in the “C” category there. I was hooked.

Shannon had a brilliant race. Attacking with Carl Decker early and racing gracefully to finish 6th. I felt like the cold I have been moaning about was mostly gone but, after the first few laps I could tell I was not doing great. Shannon and I both had great starts, we both don’t have any UCI points and started in the 6th and 7th rows back. That is about 40-50 places back from the first row FYI. I gave it all I had and just could not get up into the top 20. I hovered around the low 20′s most of the race but could not respond to an attack from Kabush (who had flatted) and some other guy in the last lap.

The next day up in Tacoma was FAST. It was like a road crit with a huge runup. That kind of course would typically be in my favor but, I just did not have the lungs to take advantage of it. You would drill it on the flat road section, drill it to the run up, drill it up the run up, drill it up the hill, drill it down the hill, drill it on the flat road section, again and again.

Shannon broke his carbon bars I think. About 3 laps in I caught him and just drilled it, hoping he was on my wheel and getting a breather. When he swapped bikes in the pit he ran past me on the next time up the run up and placed 15th. I was 26th after Sean Doyle (Desalvo bikes) pulled away from me in the last lap. One spot out of the money!

All in all, I am pleased with my racing. I salvaged my first 2 UCI races, not getting lapped by the leaders and learning a little bit about the caliber of racing I am aspiring to. I did not make any technical mistakes though, admittedly I rode more conservatively than usual. I knew I did not have the energy to recover from a big crash or fumble so I took the side of caution. A crash can put you back ten places. My technique needs work, this is only my 4th season on a cross bike so I like to think I am still learning. It is pretty clear to me that I am not even in the race with the lead riders at this point. Still looking forward to a top 20 UCI finish and even bettering that by the end of this year.

I am promoting the Veloshop Portland International raceway cyclocross classic this Sunday!

I expect to see you all there. It is going to be fast and muddy!