Stadt Moers Cyclo Cross 27 Nov 2016 – race preview

This year edition of the Stadt Moers Cross is a joint venture between the North Cheshire Clarion and the Liverpool Mercury. One feature that hasn’t changed is the “fast” flowing course with a mixture of grass, path and cobbled road. Parking for the Vets / Ladies, Senior races will be on Fallows Way, follow signs for the Whiston Enterprise Park.

There is limited parking at the Rangers Hut, but is likely to fill up with the Youth and younger riders.

The start will be on the path near the Lake, however a degree of caution and respect to fellow riders is required as there are fixed items of furniture that will cause serious injury if a rider veers off the path and hits it. So please ride cautiously on the path until you reach the grass to the race proper on the wide course. Riders will be gridded in rows of 6 and please line up in the marked sections according to your League placing. Guest riders please contact Ray Pugh or Matt Hacker to request a gridded start position.

There will be a couple of small logs to bunny hop on the first climb so get practising to avoid giving the photographers an AOT incident.

Finally, show consideration to passing riders when travelling down the fast path from M7 to M9 on the map – there are wooden slats on either side of the path in places that are slippy but with sufficient room to pass safely.

View the GRIDDING strategy for VET / Women and Sen / Jun races … The reason for gridding is to allow the riders to get onto the course appropriate to their speed and thus each rider should place themselves in their respective Block relative to their League position or ability. The Commissiare will be grid the front Block so the remaining Blocks are to self policed by the riders themselves. If you see a rider who is definitely in the wrong group – such as a novice, please highlight this to the rider and/or an official.

Please take time to find which Block you should start in by viewing the current League table. Signs will be placed at the start to identify the Gridding Blocks.

Faster riders and non League riders with less or no counting points should be placed just behind their competitors of similar ability. It is the initial starting in the wrong place and veering sideways when overtaking slower riders that causes crashes the gridding is intended to avoid.