GamJams.net: Where Mid-Atlantic bike racers roll: Keeping Tempo: 9-24-07

Cross season kicked off at Charm City; road racing is taking its last gasps; and conversations everywhere are already including "2008". Here's the weekend that was:

Jared at El Dolor: "I can't remember if cyclocross always made me feel like I've got the flu, or if it was just the heat and dust from today, but this sport is way more painful than road racing." Multimedia alert - Jared's got videos.
The Unholy Rouleur offers up his perceptions of Charm City, in inimitable Unholy Rouleur style: "I was looking at pictures of myself riding, and I think it was Mencken's comment struck me: what's amazing about a dog walking on its hind legs is not that it walks poorly, but that it can do so at all." Le Rouleur is the Dennis Miller of bike bloggers. (I had to look it up too - here.) Um, yeah, pretty sure that was Minkin, or whoever.
Scott of Scotts Right of Way hit Charm City also, offers a pretty clear view of the start, and then this disclaimer: "(the rest of this post is a lame attempt to reconstruct events from the haze of battle that even now is not entirely clear)". And 10-year-old Jake put his practice to the test, slogging it out in the Under 16 Event.
Frank from Biketopia achieved his three goals for the event: "Don't DNF. Don't puke. Don't finish last." You seeing the pattern emerge here?
Chris at Beer Frites Waffles was there as well, and points out that the Baltimore Sun covered the event (they're even bigger than GamJams.net) with a story called "It hurts a lot, but it's a lot of fun."
Gwadzilla has the right ratios, with "before the race, during the race, after the race" getting about equal weight.
Still got road racing on your mind? Well, you can put it on your calendar for at least one more weekend. JB and K-Blogg both offer reports and pics from the first ever Virginia Beach Soccer Stadium Crit, held at the brand new loop around the VA Beach stadium that was 10 years in the planning. And there's one more race next weekend if you've just realized on yesterday's training ride that you're finally peaking - flyer is here.
And some local folks have traveled a bit for a season extender weekend - to Bermuda. I noticed in my log files this AM I had some traffic from there, and remembered the Bermuda Grand Prix was this weekend. Only I don't remember the event attracting such quality. Laura Van Gilder of Cheerwine won the women's GC, and in the Elite Men it was Russell Downing of Health Net just nosing out Karl Menzies by 9 seconds, among a field stacked with some recognizable Slipstream names as well. Local notables included Josh Frick, David Bozak, Nick Mulder and Mark Sommers all of Clean Currents p/b Don Beyer Volvo mixing it up with the heavy hitters from Slipstream and HealthNet. And then there's Jason Meidhof, who finished 15th in the GC, less than a minute back from the lead. Only this Jason Meidhof is listed as riding for CleanCurrents p/b Don Beyer Volvo as well, and the Jason Meidhof we know rides for NCVC. Doesn't he?

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