There still seems to be nothing posted about CX Cupen for the year so my plans of getting a tävlingslicens are pretty much zero at the moment. It is also a sign that GCK's webpage now also has the link to the race schedule in Denmark. The enthusiasm for long-distance travel does not seem to be there this year.

Meanwhile, in Denmark I can take Motion class, race 50 min + 1 lap and pay roughly 50DKK for the experience. No licence. No problems. And one should point out that you can drive to CPH twice for the same cost as once to Branäs and if you stay in Malmö it is even cheaper for hotels.

Not to mention the reasonably-priced tasty beer options. De er dejlig!

Well, talk about a completely different situation compared to last CX training with GCK. It still started with half a day of rain but that managed to stop by the time we started. It seemed to be 'snabba pojkar' day as the best in Göteborg's cycling all converged to remind me than I am not quite so fast as I might think or sound when I write here. But great training it was and certainly a nice reunion.

This time (luckily) we stayed at Slottsskogsvallen and I had more control over my bike in the forest parts...so much so that it became superkul to take all the banked corners and little hill parts. Good good. But I also remembered that I never train at night so my body was screaming 'Ehh...e du go eller?' for the entire time. Have to work on that.

Some highlights were the sprint to the end of the grusplan followed by panic braking, jumping off the bike and running around the corner before remount and sprint back. This is something I have been training for weeks but at high speed and with dirt sticking in the pedals it just did not work. Fair enough. One thing that did work is my front brake since I was close to taking a handlebar vurpa in grand style.

Once we got to a lap we started with a bit of lagtempo with Patrik leading first. The stairs felt fine, the remount after was sådär and the one-shoe-out hill slide got easier with time. But on this first lap I misread a mud corner and took a fairly typical vurpa and did not hit my shoulder. That has to be a first. Anyway, upp på cykel and continue on the grass/grus/grus/grass/grus part until it was my turn to lead the lap. I did my best to do this at full speed and I also did my best to hit every possible water puddle and get completely soaked. Very fun. By the time we did the actual race I was dead so I just took my 5 laps at my pace, making sure to take the stairs each time (it was optional...but why skip the best part?). I also didn't get lapped which is a victory in its own right.

I tried to get some details from CC Lasse and the others but no one seems to know much about CX Cupen, the classes and even if/when Introcross will start. There were a couple positive comments about racing in Denmark and some will do the entire Swedish cup. But things should be more clear soon. For now I have a week of meetings and guest entertaining here but next Thursday I will be back in training business. Although first I need to clean my bike so a träningsvärk Skatås trip is looming...

On my first trip out towards Tahult I stopped at the bus shelter to check my map and I saw a note that is more true than ever..."This note has more readers than your blog". Funny enough this particular bus shelter was in the middle of nowhere so even this note could not have had that many readers. Yet it is still true. The cykelblogg trend is over now that everyone has a cykelblogg. When I first started with this I figured that no one would bother reading about my cycling and training. And yet people did. But now I only get readers searching for Ridley X-Ride.

By the way, the 2013 Ridley X-Ride can have disc brakes and I do not have one of these. So I would be more than happy to test ride one and promote it everywhere I go. I also read that Ridley will have newly-designed mountainbikes. Me want.

Anyway, the weekend started with my usual CX pass except this time in some proper sucking wet grass. Then it was Kulturkalaset followed by sleeping in on Sunday which led me to miss CX training. Blä. So instead I felt like a drive and that inspiration took me all the way to Dalsland to see their canal and other various beautiful lakes. Nice drive indeed.

Then tomorrow it is time for some CX training with GCK and I am definitely going because I already know I will not be able to train much for the next week. Just a few too many meetings/conferences all scheduled at the same time. But this is temporary. I will be the master of Introcross. =)

As you know I need a new MTB frame that is the correct size and with Eurobike in a couple of weeks there are plenty of things to google at the moment. If you are a tekniknörd with a wallet to support it, 2013 is looking to be the year for you.

I like a good comparison test and this one at MountainBikeAction caught my attention. And what worries me is that basically every company that has leaked their 2013 lineup seemed to be 100% 29er. But according to the test the 29er is slow to get rolling, harder to stop and means that you can get away with bad technique when the trail gets rough. I got the feeling that 29ers were for fat lazy people that did not really care about skill and did not want too much excitement. Kind of like the people who buy Korean cars. This test was all for 27.5er while the good old 26er came last. It said that you have to be talented to go fast on a 26er.

There is basically no complete 27.5er on the market yet unless you can squish bigger tires on your 26er and probably Eurobike will show us a whole pile of new options. But it will cost. The first production year is always expensive because trend sets the price and not reality. Kind of like how an Autumn 2012 pair of jeans costs 1400kr yet an almost identical pair of jeans from last year would cost 700kr at an outlet. I don't think I can jump on the 27.5er trend in the first year unless it can work with the components I have.

So it looks like I will be continuing on a 26er if I can still find a frame in that size. I have the fork and the components already so this is the cheapest option until 27.5ers are available here and all the bugs are fixed. And while I am doing so I can pass 29ers going uphill, I can crush them in a final sprint and I can claim to have superb technical abilities for riding it through singletrack without falling. Plus, I get more training out of the whole deal. Yes, give me a 26er again.

To be honest there has not been very much cross in Chris Cross these last few days. Way Out West left me humming German songs and extremely tired so my Sunday morning trip on the Ridley was not terribly fast. But I did tackle the grass hills at Kviberg again so my muscles did get some benefit. And the tempo riding along the path beside Säveån was great for handling at high speeds.

Since then Göteborgs Kulturkalaset has occupied my time and also filled my stomach with yet more junk food. But I am still trying to keep up the training so I have the routine up before I get piles of work again.

I also seem to have taken a big axe to SCF on Facebook under the CX discussions because I really do believe that no beginner in cycling will ever agree to pay a pile of money just to race a few motionslopp now and again. And the lack of incentive means we have piles of excellent cyclists that are outside of the system. I work with several of them. Maybe I am just a bit sensitive tonight since my TV box is busted and now I will have to go and yell at Telia and probably get stuck buying a new one. But it just seems to me like things are very messed up in a sport that could potentially be great for so many people. In only their second year Dalslands X-Country had over 500 cyclists and they had nothing to do with SCF.

Just make a good race. Don't complicate things with rules because people will lose interest.

Once again those at Vasaloppet have placed CykelVasan on the same weekend as the only music festival worth going to, Way Out West. And after finding out that Blur and Feist were on the list for one of these two events it was again an easy choice. Of course CykelVasan was already sold out by then so I suppose 'choice' is the wrong word. But I did choose anyway and paid a pile of cash.

And how is a festival like CykelVasan you might ask? Well, it is a lot like MTB marathon training because it lasts so long and you are in the same position for most of that time. After the first two hours your upper body gets all stiff and you start to get cramps in your legs. And when you feel hungry you stop at a strange looking tent and get something which is sort of food but mostly is just designed to get you to the next food stop. Then there is the dehydration risk which they have also solved by having some dodgy tap water stations. Both have their sprint sections where your pulse rises for 3-4 minutes but mostly you just enjoy the sights and keep going.

Sure, there are also disadvantages with WoW like getting marinated in cigarette smoke but things like crowding are just as common in MTB as festivals. And, just like MTB, you can always take it easy and go to the back where you can run your own race. At the end of the race you can have a medal while the festival equivalent is a T-shirt. Both can be used to bragg and make your colleagues feel like they missed the greatest event ever. And your colleagues will not understand and you will be forever labelled musiknörd, cykelnörd or some other nörd depending what is most trendy.

Or why not be ambitious and check out the proper races in Belgium? Here is a link to the CX schedule for the season 2012-13. Any race with a D - C - B on it would be open for us Veteran. Well, at least D class anyway...

I also found a blog called Dr. Funk's Belgian Cyclocross Experience which seems to be by a fellow Canadian that also caught the CX bug and had to try it out for real.

Hmmm....

Here is something for you cross riders down in Skåne...the preliminary CX schedule for Denmark. Check here for details. While Sweden decides to reduce the number of cup races they are basically running every weekend across the bridge. But their Post Cup seems to be the equivalent of our CX Cup, except that it has been around a lot longer.

Things that caught my eye were 24-25 nov and this CX Fix Etapeløb which sounds very unique. Their promo video here seems like fun. And I am assuming that everything with Sjælland will be fairly close to CPH so it would be easy to fill in those extra gaps in the schedule.

I still don't even have a competition licence for this year so it would be great if someone could post some details about the classes in CX Cup. If I can race in sport and get a few points while not having to get a licence it would be perfect.

Another weekend and that means another 2 passes on the CX. Yesterday was TvättaCrossen since the only real goal with the pass was to ride over to Skatås and use the hose to wash off the remains of PanicCrossen. But the wet grass all over Sävedalen meant a whole pile of spontaneous tree slaloms, grass hills and some hill running before taking 8:an and the other grusväg around Delsjön to eventually reach Skatås. I had to take a few laps around the small field next to the fenced football fields since it is famous for slippery gravel and I suck at corners there. The wet made it not quite as slippery but I tried a few corners with my shoe unclipped to try and really slide my way around. Need a bit more work at that.

And then this morning it was TempoCrossen which started at the grass field next to Allum where I did a few dismounts/stairs. Then over to Säveån where there are some nice little hills and tree slaloms but there was not so much to entertain a CX rider. So I decided on tempo to Jonsered to see if I could find anything there. Nope. Just a nice lake and a stop for a banana. So it was tempo back again via Kåhög and the famous wind stretch which not-surprisingly is a lot easier on the CX.

A lot of my training is just on basic CX technique because in my case I can gain just as much time with better technique as I can with better muscles. And my improvements this season suggest that my muscles are doing just fine. My bike remounts are much better already and I am working on corners. My acceleration is great and I am learning what my brakes can do and how the Ridley behaves. All this will save me minutes. Riding at max will still need training but GbgSuperPrestige will help with that.

People are starting to discuss CX Cupen already which is encouraging but before I decide on anything I am wondering about the cup rules. When you are like me at the bottom end of Superklassen the points do not really matter...even if I can place well in the cup by doing every race. I thought the point this year was to have less cup races and more local series. Other than GbgSuperPrestige I would not mind heading to Borås, Jkpg or Skåne sometimes too. So for example Branäs is of no interest at all for me. Instead I could go to Skåne or Denmark two other weekends and not end up driving any farther. But maybe I might change my mind if they come up with some smart points system. The rest of the weekends fit with my plans and to make my guess at the secret location for the Sthlm weekend I vote for Hammarby or that general area towards Hellasgården. I also vote for a rematch at Frescati. But I hope they are not thinking about Tullinge where Lida Loop starts because that is nowhere near anything.

The other day's Göteborgs CK posting by Sven sounded very urgent. In Sthlm they are already training CX. Oh no. And now I read on Öijer's blog that they will conclude CX-Cupen and give extra points to make sure everyone shows up. So I can see that the pride of Göteborg in the CX world was at risk. We must train...PanicCrossen!

This is the first club training I have done in more than a year so I overestimated the driving time to get to Slottsskogsvallen and was sitting there for about 40 min. During that time one hell of a thunderstorm had passed but things looked okay at 18.30. CC Lasse decided for what I thought of as untraditional CX training over at Änggården so my first job was to see if I could keep up with those in the upper side of Superklassen. I made it halfway up the hill before I had to give up the fight but that was satisfying.

But my brain kicked in with the rain and I started to chicken out everywhere. On my MTB wet rocks means a nasty fall over 50% of the time so seeing wet rocks was not making me happy. Even if I had plenty of grip and was not sliding, my brain would not let go. It wasn't so bad at the top and there were some nice chances for attacking hills and trying to catch people but when the rain really started and we began to roll back downhill my glasses had 'permafog' and I couldn't see anything, plus my brakes were not working plus, again, the wet rocks.

After this I was not so enthusiastic back down in the forest part at Vallen so instead I decided to run up the famous stairs a few times and roll around the grusplan and slide there. But I will be back even if next week is Way Out West and the week after I will probably also be festivalling.