Lake Travis Cyclery

Texas CX

Yesterday the always awesome webtacular All Hail The Black Market included a short discussion of the possibility of CX Nats coming to Austin. I felt compelled to respond. Here’s what I think.

Dear Stevil,

After reading your 1/25 post I felt inclined to add my voice to the chorus discussion of the possibility of an Austin, TX CX Nats. My kneejerk reaction to these sorts of suggestions is always a resounding HELL NO! My reasoning is simple. Events like this tend to draw a great many out of town ne’er-do-wells who will discover Austin is a shit-ton of happy and some of them will want to move here. I just can’t abide that.

However, after examining the entrails of my heart, clapping twice and bowing to the east, I as a moral person must admit that an Austin CX Nats would be wonderful in the two most vital ways.

#1: Austin is an amazing town where everybody will have a great time at bargain prices.

#2: It will grow the sport.

Now I know many people will object to #2. Many of those folks discovered CX in 2009 and have pronounced it pristine, and would like nothing more than to end every season by sealing CX up in a hermetically sealed jar, rap the jar in a cloth of the finest velvet, and then locking it in the memory chest they keep under their bed with the other things that are really awesome but I wouldn’t have heard of yet. When can all understand that impulse, but we must remember that it comes from a selfish, elitist place in our souls that makes us not play well with others and vote for Ron Paul.

The truth is all sports are either growing or dying as participants constantly enter and exit the ranks. At this point I theorize that all the able bodied residents of Boulder, Portland, Seattle and Bend that might ever ride CX are either currently riding or have previously ridden and have now moved on to something else. For the sake of this discussion we’ll call it the Hipster Equilibrium. Continuing to hold races only in areas of high CX density provides no new experiences for the current participants and engages very little new potential participants. I’m sure there are many folks in eastern Tennessee that would prefer NASCAR had just stayed a small local pastime. I also wish that were true, because I strongly dislike NASCAR. But by moving NASCAR races around the country they aggressively exposed themselves to a new audience*. The result being lots of growth, lots of new opportunities for the participants and fans, and me having to curse my TV because there seems to be a NASCAR race on every freaking day.

So, in summation: If CX Nats comes to Austin everyone will have a good time, CX will be on TV everyday, and all your childhood heroes will love and acknowledge you in exactly the ways you have always dreamed of. Game. Set. Match. Austin.

*Note: If you are going to expose yourself, it is really fundamentally important to do so aggressively.

Tootles,

The Green Mamba