Psycho Cross Wrap Up

What started out as a wet morning turned into a muddy day of racing. Or should I say, very muddy day of racing. Kicking off things was the Junior race, and some eager beavers and plenty of wet pavement saw a few of the youngsters hit the deck until they got a feel for the course and it's slipperyness. It was Matt Lipscomb of the Fulton Flyers team taking the early lead and the rest of the pack would never see him again. Matt would also place 9th in the B race later in the day. Coming in 2nd was Fraziers Phillip O'Donnell with Andrew Macrae coming in 3rd.

Next race up was the C race. Out of nowhere Chris Wyatt riding for Specialized took control of this race and rode away with the victory. Notable in this race was Chris and Aaron Chamberlain of Faster Mustache we're the two closest rider to making it all the way up the mudded out run-up section next to the granstand. Both riders got their front wheel over the curb but wouldn't quite get the last little bit. Aaron was also doing it on a single speed, so hat's off to him. Also of note was Banana-man himself, Tom Cross. Riding a converted road bike with zero mud clearance, what looked like 42 x 19 gearing and wearing a huge banana costume, Tom hung tough in the race and finished things up after hitting the deck hard on the turn off the apron.

In the Masters race, early on it looked like it might be a tough battle up the front between reigning GA Cross champion Brady Rogers and one of the GTC team riders. After a few laps of riding together, Brady hit the afterburners and left his riding mate in his mudd splatter to take the win handily from Torre Smitherman with Jeff Welp rounding out the podium in 3rd place.

Moving onto the women's race we saw cat woman make an appearance. Jennifer Horn took the early lead and was never challenged on her way to victory, but the battle for 2nd place was a hot one. Elizabeth Lee held 2nd place for a good while with a descent gap over cross newcomer Krista Eckhart. By half race distance Eckhart seemd to have figured the course out and started to close the gap to Lee. With just a couple of laps to go Eckhart made contact with Lee and they swapped places several times up until the last half of the last lap. Hitting the muddiest section of the course Eckhart seemed to pull out some MTB skills that she had up her sleeve and opened a gap on Elizabeth Lee that she would never be able to close again, and took a great 2nd place in what I believe is her first ever cross race.

The B race looked like it would be a competitive bunch and for much of the race the battle for the lead was cracker. Mike Mathney and Josh Singer exchanged the lead numerous times throughout the race, with Josh trying to ride the run-up every lap, losing some time, but coming back out of the trees with the lead again. It looked like it would go down to the wire between these 2 but towards the end of the race Mathney turned up the heat on Singer and forced Singer to get out of the kitchen, and allow Mathney to ride away with the win in the last few laps. Eric Nicoletti had a great ride to finish in 3rd place.

Moving onto the A race it was a hot field in more ways than one. Oscar Clark, Alex Clifford, and Emile Abraham brought the real heat to this battle, but it was Joe Eldridge and Mike Creed in their respective drag outfits that brought a different kind of heat to the mix. With banana's in their bra's, the gun went off and they were racing. Oscar Clark took the lead early and with a couple of crashes behind him on the first lap, he had opened a short gap over Emile Abraham, which he would never close. Clark settled into a nice rythem and steered clear of the Eldridge/Creed zaniness as those guys were clearly out for a good time, even sharing a banana late in the race. A notable effort goes out to the Gladiator who had been hanging tough in his shirt-less gladiator costume until he crashed on the transition onto the track and slid on his shirtless back down the banking. Needless to say he decided better of returning to the race. In the end it was Clark taking a sound victory with Alex Clifford of Faster Mustache taking 2nd place and Eric Neely winning the battle for 3rd from Emile Abraham and Tim Barrett.

A good time was had by all, and the EPVA would like to send out a special thank you to all of our volunteers on the day, without which we wouldn't have had the event run as smoothly as it did. We should have some links to photo's posted tomorrow, so lookout for those.