Jen's long awaited cross debut

Last Saturday our very own Jenny Hettich made her cyclocross debut on a course that, well, almost reminded me of a cyclocross course. . . sort of. Most of us throttle back on a first race, trying not to apply too much strategy. But Jen was determined to get a good start so as to avoid getting in a wreck in that first tight right turn. As the field hammered down the long drag race start and through the tight turn, Jen sat comfortably 8th place. Just as I thought to myself "this is going to go really well" Jen was promptly forced out of her line into the knobby grass, resulting in a small crash(#1). No big deal, except there goes the field.

Jen's strong motor allowed her to pass girls throughout the race. This effort to move forward was briefly interrupted when she over cooked a piece of singltrack and found a tree(#2). No worries, it was a small tree.

Jen attributes her nice technique to Jeremy Powers

On the final lap Jen caught a friend of ours, Michelle, that she had been chasing down for 2 laps. She was able to pass her on the straight away. The cross-eyed fatigue of racing must have set in, because Jen clipped her toe on the first of the quadruple barriers and she went down (#3). This gave Michelle a free pass in the barriers. But in a moment of cyclocross irony, Michelle returned the favor over the fourth barrier, allowing Jen to overtake again and hold her off to keep the spot. I believe the finish was 18th overall.

It was a great first race for Jen and she's looking forward to racing with Blue Sky Nation in the future. It's always exciting to see yet another Blue Sky racer passing people through the barriers!

In other news, Andy suffered again. . .