a season, in brief

I keep putting off writing some kind of season summary. You know, since I already put off writing all those individual race reports. We're at late December already??

In the very least, a set of lists from the season (or really, season post-Guelph):

Good races (felt good, happy with my results)

• Barrie Cross - awesome fight for 3rd with Lori
• CSAJ Racing at Riverdale - good weather + win + friends + Jet Fuel
• Kelso Halloween Stage Race, Day 1
• Toronto International Cyclocross, Day 2
  
• Willow Beach

Not so good races (felt awful, was unnecessarily pouty re: results)

• Hillbilly Hustle - it's been a long time since I've been lapped by the women's leader!
• Kelso Halloween Stage Race, Day 2 - just did not care while racing and gave up, which was worse than anything else

Things I learned

• Sometimes work takes up a lot of extra time and energy. That's normal, and you aren't a complete slacker for failing to train as much as you had planned however-many months ago.
• Your attitude is more important than results ever are.
• Not allowed to decide to quit racing/sell all bikes until at least 4 days after a "bad" race. At which point, you probably feel really dumb and/or melodramatic, and won't really want to quit at all. And if you do, you can post that stuff on ebay now!
• goals --> motivation --> momentum to get through difficult points in the season. Although sometimes it still just comes down to "discipline before desire" (aka "do it because you know you need to, not necessarily because you want to").

Still, overall, a great season. Provincials deserves its own post (which, at the rate I am blogging, you can expect sometime in February). No complaints, just lots to look forward to for next year.