Compton cruises to 9th national championship victory

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Katie Compton (Trek Cyclocross Collective) won her 9th consecutive US National Cyclo-cross Championship on Sunday, one week after clinching the UCI World Cup title in Rome, Italy. Compton will be heading home to Colorado to get in some final training before heading to take on Marianne Vos at the World Championships in Louisville, Kentucky.

"It's a special day and everybody comes with their A-game," replied Compton when asked if her 9th title was a target for the season. "It's very special to me and I want to win. I don't want to be over-confident and come in over-tired and get beat."

Nicole Duke (Alchemy) spent the minutes before call-ups collecting herself near the Cyclo-cross Nationals media room in the Verona Town Library. Duke's preparation worked for when the gun went off she aggressively grabbed the hole shot and held the lead through the first muddy sections of the course until Compton passed her on the first hill.

Compton quickly established a 30 second lead before the first downhill section, located half a lap into the race. Compton conservatively pegged her lead at just over 30 seconds to a chase group that included Duke, Meredith Miller (California Giant Berry Farms/Specialized), and Kaitlin Antonneau (Cannondale-Cyclocrossworld.com).

With one lap out of the way Compton opened up and rapidly grew her lead, leaving the race for second and third the main event of the day. Rocking her bike side to side as she found the right line through the challenging course Compton entered the pit every half a lap to switch bikes.

Compton's pit crew, led by her husband Mark Legg, ran a smooth operation despite running out of water on the first lap. "In chaos there is that ability to try and figure how to get everything done," said Legg who was aided by a team of people from Compton's Wisconsin-based sponsor Trek. "The mud was changing so quickly, at first I didn't want to use water because everything would freeze, and then the mud was just turning to concrete. I was chiseling the dirt off of chainrings. It was nuts."

At the start of the third lap Miller, Duke and Antonneau held a solid lead of 15 seconds over Jade Wilcoxson (Team Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies) and Teal Stetson-Lee (Team Luna Chix.) Then halfway through lap three Antonneau and Miller were suddenly out of the picture after both riders independently crashed and suffered mechanical issues with their chains, a problem that plagued riders in both the men's and women's races throughout the day.

Despite her own mechanical issues Duke made up time on the rough and slippery downhill sections of the course, which she rode aggressively, lap after lap. Jade Wilcoxson, however, made a successful push in the final lap of the race to overpower Duke and take second place, 1:20 behind Compton.

Wilcoxson, a relative new-comer to the 'cross scene, spent her lead-up to nationals training at the velodrome in Los Angeles. "I'm actually coming off of a nine-day track camp down in LA," said Wilcoxson, who finished third in the NRC standings this past year. "I finished that up just on Friday and that turned out to be pretty good, that steady power, that's what you needed for this course."

Duke hammered in for third, three seconds behind Wilcoxson, a finish that successfully capped off a rough season. "That was pretty epic," recounted Duke after crossing the line. "I had a lot, a lot of mishaps. I felt like a scrapper out there. I knew if I could just stay steady on the flats, and uphills, I had everyone on the downhills. It felt really good and gave me confidence."

The race was a disappointment for several riders like Georgia Gould who came to Wisconsin with great form and a hope to give Compton a run for her money. "It was terrible. Ridiculously terrible. I don't even know what to say," said Gould who still managed fourth place, 1:42 behind Compton. "I just could not get out of my own way in those frozen ruts and mud. Finally by the end I was feeling a little more comfortable and knew the lines. It just took me a while to get my bearings out there."

Compton's next objective is the World Cyclo-cross Championships where she will take on the top cyclist in the world, Marianne Vos. "She's super-strong, fast, and technically good, so she's always the person to watch, and she's only going to get faster." said Compton when asked about her main rival for the world title. "I just want to come in with good form, good legs, and have a good race."

The World Cyclo-cross Championships will be contested in Louisville, Kentucky on February 2-3, the first time the event will be held outside of Europe.

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