Eva Bandman - one year from today

Eva Bandman park in Louisville, Kentucky will be the venue for the 2012 and 2013 master's cyclocross world championships. I haven't seen an official schedule, but I suspect the 2012 event will be one year from today. The park is also the venue for the 2013 elite cyclocross world championships as well as an annual stop for the USGP series. It's cool to see a permanent cyclocross venue in the U.S. In fact, I am only aware of one other permanent public cyclocross venue, near Hamburg Germany. I raced there in 2007, lining up against the legendary Richard Groenendaal among others. For the record, he lapped me in under 30 minutes.

Eva Bandman park has great raw material for a cyclocross course - grass, pavement, a wooded section, a fair amount of silty natural sand as well as a man-made sand pit, and both natural and man-made hills.

I can't wait!

Badger Prairie - one year from today

The date for the U.S. cylocross national championships will move from early December to early January. So 2011 won't actually have a CX nationals - they'll be January 4-8, 2012. Most likely, my masters category race will be one year from today. In fact, I think my race might start exactly one year from now. You get some sense of the substantial elevation change the venue has to offer in this photo from 2009 (photo Djonn McNeil):

While I suspect we're more likely to have snow and ice than mud (at this moment it's 11 degrees in Madison), I'll always remember the October, 2007 event fondly. Mud is my friend. (photo Amy Dykema):

It's official

SRAM Factory was registered with USA Cycling as a club team for 2011. Our club ID is 13398. This club is open to all SRAM employee-athletes. You are sure to see SRAM Factory team members competing in other cycling disciplines over the coming year, but this blog is devoted to our cyclocross exploits. That may include some pre-season racing in other cycling disciplines.

Although newly registered with USA Cycling, the SRAM Factory team has existed since 2005. It was started at SRAM's Schweinfurt, Germany location and focussed almost exclusively on MTB racing. Here's a shot of SRAM's winning team at the 2005 'Schaflos im Sattel' (sleepless in the saddle) dusk to dawn race:

And another after winning the 2007 Kuelsheim 12 hour race:

We did a little cyclocross racing as well. This is the Struhlendorf Deutschland Cup race from 2006:

 We're looking forward to a great 2011.