First Race of the Season for Nicole!

By Nicole Messinger
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

I decided that my first race of the 2008 season would be Chandler Park Cyclocross in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I know October might seem a tad late to start off the season, but work with me on this one.

After about a 2 hour drive I arrived at the venue, unpacked all the necessities, met a few people, and set off to pre-ride the course. During my pre-ride I found a few rough spots that I vowed not to run over during the race, little did I know this course would be full of rough spots. Another thing that caught my attention about this course was the length, this monster seemed to go on forever!

The starting line was packed, there were 3 of us, and I settled in at the back… way back. The first few laps weren’t too bad, except on the first lap when I exclaimed, “Oh crap, which way do I go?” There were a few points where the course could have been more clearly marked, especially as the 45 minutes went on. Another thing that became more bothersome as the race went on were the rough patches in the grass. You couldn’t see them, but you sure felt them.

A feature of this course that I really enjoyed was the run-up as it gave me an opportunity to demonstrate my new found skill of shouldering the bike (thanks Ken and crew). Ok, I enjoyed it for the first 15-20 minutes, and toward the end I don’t know if I’d have survived without shouldering the bike through this area.

Chandler Park really was a nice race on a nice course. Everyone seemed to really enjoy it. I know that I’ll be back for more soon enough.

This fabulous post was written by one of our awesome bella volunteers ~ To change this standard text, you have to enter some information about your self in the Dashboard -> Users -> Your Profile box.