It’s not often that I say, “Wow, I’m glad I didn’t go to cyclo-cross nationals.” But this is one of those rare occasions.
Somehow, the promoters, USA Cycling and the Austin Parks and Recreation Department — after four days of running lesser championship and non-championship events — found themselves at odds over whether Sunday’s Big Finale was appropriate given the appallingly ‘cross-like conditions at the venue, Zilker Park.
A less-than-joyous noise apparently having been made unto the Lord by some non-Belgian whose voice carries, the marquee events were first canceled, then postponed until Monday, though a sober copy editor might raise a few pointed questions about the “Barring more rain” qualifier in the headline some USAC media type slapped atop its announcement.
I’ve been to ‘cross nats more than a time or two, and I can’t recall anything like this happening anywhere else, despite flood, freeze, snow or snafu. Course changes? Si. Cops running people away from the venue, perhaps never to return? No.
Someone has intercoursed the penguin with a vengeance here, and if I were sitting on a flat wallet in an Austin Motel 6 with a useless race number, all kitted up with no place to go but home, I’d want to know who the hell the all-hat, no-cattle sonofabitch is. If he had a brain, he’d be out playing with it, as Dan Jenkins once wrote.
Everything’s bigger in Texas, they say. I guess that goes for the fuck-ups, too. Oops.
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