Marian’s Stuck

By Marian Hunting
Santa Barbara, Cali

My Convert ‘Cross Race Report

Singlespeed race:

Again I was the only one on the start line with matching sex chromosomes, but I was not going to be deterred and I was not going to be dfL, which was a pleasant change. Race started out with a long pavement drag strip that had all of us singlespeeders spun out like a five-year old on a Halloween’s worth of HFCS. Lots of grass, lots of tight turns, some upsy-downsies, a sharp-lipped, flat-tire special, and no rest whatsoever.

I started, I finished.

Women’s race:

I had a much better start than I normally have and I was in the top 8 for the first quarter of a lap. I remember thinking to myself “Killer! Alright, now let’s just keep our $hit together and not f*ck it up!”

Of course I then proceeded to do exactly that.

Hit the the round log hop with full battering ram force, almost lost my bars and lost several places. After the first set of barriers, my drawers got caught on my saddle and in a blink of an eye I went from respectable midpack to dfL.

Suck, suck, suck.

The grass was slow, the turns were tight, there was no rest anywhere, and after the first lap, I had had plenty of the whole racing thing but it just kept on going and going, like a terrible dream.

A terrible dream that I had already lived through on the singlespeed.

Suck, suck, suck.

And there were so many people out there cheering for me (You all do realize that I kind of suck at this, right?) and like Morgan, I kind of wanted to stop and apologize to them for sucking so hard.

Mostly I just wanted to stop.

Suck, suck, suck.

All those turns.

Tight turns.

Turns that made me realize that the Buick Roadmaster station wagon has a better turning radius than I do.

Suck, suck, suck.

And people kept cheering for me but there I was, stuck in suck.

Some of my fans, aren’t they fabulous?

Suck, suck, suck.

I remember towards the end of the race telling myself “I will only do one more lap of this. One lap max and then I’m pulling the plug. This is a fat load of malarky!” So through the start/finish I looked at the lap cards & it was two to go.

Suck, suck, suck.

“Alright,” I told myself, “I’ll do one more lap. But, if I do one more lap, then I will actually only have one more lap left to do and I can’t very well pull the plug with only one to go can I? GAH! Oh please, dear God make it stop!”

Suck, suck, suck.

“Please, God, make it stop! Ohh, beer!” Grabbed a beer. Fumbled the beer.

Suck, suck, suck.

But then a nice young man in a bright red skinsuit ran across the course, rescued my beer, and handed it off to me again. “Hoo-ray for boys!” This time I didn’t fumble it & was able to drink what was left of it.

And then I got lapped by Coryn Rivera.

Suck, suck, suck.

But then, remarkably, it was over and I hadn’t even finished dfL.

And what the wise man says, that two wrongs don’t make a right, is true, but two wrongs followed up by 5 beers in quick succession makes for some awesome heckling of the Pro/1/2 Men. This week had me hollering “Ride it like you have a pair!”, “C’mon, ride it like you mean it, boy!”, and as per the wise man’s suggestions, “Stop sucking!”

Perhaps I got a little excited, but honestly, sometimes I can’t help myself; ‘cross is hot!

The end.

P.S. I realized after this weekend that perhaps I should be thankful that boys don’t like me because ‘cross racing is horrible for the lady parts. Especially two ‘cross races in a row on a terribly bumpy grass course.)

Photos by Kimberly Jo & RTinney. Grazie!

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