Minuteman Road Club

Nearly bailed on this race due to the horrendous weather but I'm glad I went. Unlike road races I found that in cross your body warms up INSTANTLY, and into the first lap I didn't even notice the weather.

I did the 4s race with a few other MRC guys, Bruce being right behind me at the start. I lined up nice - front row - which clearly helped because I was able to stay top 8 throughout the whole race. I moved up to around 6th before hitting the deck on a grassy/muddy corner (gotta love first race) before the first set of barriers and losing a couple of spots. I held my position for the next few laps (despite crashing on another corner) and noticed some guys fading with 2 to go. On the final lap I picked off a pair of guys on the long single-track section in the woods, caught another guy on the final barrier (hill), and hammered the straight away to catch the rider in 5th. I caught the next guy after the log remount, screaming 'cause it hurt so bad! Into the final corners I managed to stay on a kid in 3rd riding for CL Noonan and sprinted toward the line. I just caught him for second.

I thought the course was great. I liked the single track woodsy section and straight away/log section the best. The hill/corner/barrier part was also fun. Gloucester day #2 was my only other race so it's hard to compare, but I enjoyed the layout.

Saw a lot of MRC out there, and I must say the cheers definitely helped a ton. Thanks! Looking forward to other reports.
-PJ

PJ nice race. Definitely impressive. I ended up about 20th. Tried to stay behind you on start, unfortunately some idiot went down on that fast downhill second turn...and proceeded to start slamming his bike on the ground...right on me. Unfortunately my old engine took awhile to get going. I misfired and got passed by a bunch of people in the ess curves after the log. One MRC guy namd John -- don't know him but he was a good guy -- pulled in front of me and paced a group of 5. I wiped out on that same downhill corner on lap 3. After I got my bike in some working order, I at least got 4 liters working (still looking for that valet key) and passed John's group (sorry!) and then had a turbo boost and caught the next group of 5 on the 4th lap, though a couple got me back on the last lap. The trail in the woods seemed like the only place I could really pass people (maybe a couple before the log). Looking forward to Canton, which I seem to remember as a very fast course.

I considered tearing off the top number and lining up again for the masters race, but my bike was f'd up and I was on empty:) All in all, fun race. I met a guy named Bailey at the end who had done his first cross race (nice conditions for a first race!) and David Deitch, who had a big smile on his face.

Thank you Art and everyone else involved in running the race. Fantastic job.

Pics of the Cat 4, Jrs., Women and Masters races. Oh, and crazy dog lady!

http://doublehop.blogspot.com/

My race summary is from the official "the winner is 3ft behind you; you may continue and finish another lap if you wish".

And kudos to our race director. Art stood out there all day in horrendous conditions tending to the needs of officials, racers and the general public. He was the first one there and the last to leave. Through wind, rain, mud, sleet and snow he delivered. thank you Art "The Mailman".

Art did a fantastic job
this were the worst conditions we had for an MRC cross race, and that includes:

high of 19 degree weather
shoveling snow to make a race course
and the rain in marlboro

today mother nature threw all of them combine, and the race went on smooth...
Fantastic job Art!

i leave you with a picture of Sweeney, this is post race, and "cleaned up"

one more thing,

did anybody pick up a saddle bag at the start?
I took mine off at the start and never went back to get it

rob

Art, amazing job. Thank you for your commitment.

If you can appreciate something truly absurd, then today was the best cross race ever It was amazing that the conditions continued to get worse the entire time I was there including during course breakdown. We actually had to bang about an inch of snow off of one of the tents to take it down. Great job by all who survived out there today.

And executing the perfect race in ridiculous conditions, well that's just what Art does.

Yup! Major thanks to Art & everyone who helped out today. Registration once again ran really smoothly thanks to several great volunteers. Ron you were a life saver with that trailer!

Jeff

Awesome PJ. What a transformation from a few weeks ago at Hopkinton.

Wish I could have been there today to see this epic.

'Champagne of Beers, dude' is what the beer hand-up guy said to me at the top of the course. How could I refuse? I took a pull and stuffed the rest into my jersey pocket for post race celebration.
I stuck to good wheels for most of the race, waited for mistakes, and attacked hard. For half the race I was turning the screws on a Boston Tri Team rider, but he attacked me during the beer feed and got away. How impolite.
I think I finished 25th, after lapping some people. At some point I may have attempted to order a 2 shot americano from a confused looking spectator.
After the race, we walked the course and repaired a bunch of shredded tape. It was greasy out there.

Big thanks to Art for making the race happen! Between the course and the weather, it was crazy fun!

Huge props to Anna, she drilled it from the gun and took an awesome win!!
congratulations to the entire women's team, they all showed who's house it was.

Who's House? that's right "their house"

That was a blast. I couldn't get the smile off my face until I passed out on the couch at 7:30.

A lot of busy people volunteered hours of cold wet shivering time to get it done. I could tell you twenty stories off the top of my head about people going above and beyond. A very sincere thanks to all of you for helping. For me personally, it felt like throwing a party where everyone has a great time. And we broke down the course in about 45 minutes.

MRC Cross rocks.

did anybody pick up Marvin's jacket??

Rob- I left my rain shell at the start line- I'm guessing someone may have picked it up- if you get it, could you bring it to the Canton race? I'm not doing any races between now and then...