December 13 - Dirty

December 13 - Dirty, originally uploaded by Jesse_Laird.

I love Bend. I love bikes. I love mud. And I love taking photos.

Several years back when I showed up for my first Search and Rescue meeting, I came home and said, "These are my kind of people!" I had the same reaction today after shooting the Elite Men's race in the 2009 Cyclocross Nationals.

Hard to choose a shot -- there's a second which is very technically clean, iconic with the smokestacks in the background, great light, and even some great gear (Team S&M has the old-skool look down, and I think it's perfect for cyclocross!) But this one was a little different, and I wanted to share something that was a little more uniquely me.

The whole set is linked in my CX Nationals photoset here at Flickr, by the way.

Love, love, loving the D700's autofocus. Also seriously loving the 70-200 AF-S 2.8 VR (I). Crisp, fast, just great to shoot with. This is one of two lenses that I've wanted for a long while, and it was a joy to shoot with today.

Areas of improvement? I need to trust/set an AF point high on the frame, rather than keeping the center point selected. I was letting the D700 do continuous focus, and follow the selected point around the frame. Which works freaking awesome, by the way. But I was tending to cutoff the wheels. I need to get focus on the face, but keep composition in mind as well.

Also, wouldn't hurt me to have stopped down a bit. Plenty of sunlight today, which made for a slick, muddy course.

Huge respect for all the men and women out there racing in this stuff, because I know that it' s not just a day like today with beer and cowbells and guys in speedos with American flags. There's all those days in the saddle in even worse weather, worse trails, and zero fans. With laundry to do, bills to pay, and bikes to clean at the end of the day. I have tremendous respect for your commitment to cycling, and it was awesome to get the chance to host your race in our town.

Keep it in the big ring, -J