I got the pleasure to shoot Sundays Boulder Cup one of the largest cyclecross races in Colorado. This was also my second time having the chance to shoot some professional riders and wow are they fast.

1. Winner of the Women's Elite Goergia Gould


2. Another of Georgia Gould


3. Winner of Men's Elite Ryan Trebon


4. Second Place Men's Elite Danny Summerhill


5. Third Place Men's Elite James Driscoll


Of coarse there were many more riders Sunday with a showing of around 700 riders.

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8. All of us can hope we are in this good of shape at 80.


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12. And of course being so close to Hallows Eve some decided to wear their constumes early.


13.


Hope you guys enjoyed the photos there are plenty more on my websight.

Ryan

Hi. If you really are looking for feedback, might I suggest you only post 2-3-4 photos. The danger with so many is that you get general feedback or worse, people are overwhelmed and give you none. I will just chose a few.
#2: I would crop much tighter and get rid of a lot of the "dead" space at the bottom. I think you can lose a lot of it but still give the scene context
#3 and #4: For me shows the difference good lighting makes. In #3, the lighting is behind the rider so they have a fairly bland, low-contrast look. Whereas in #4, the rider really "pops", is a lot more vibrant and dynamic simply because the light is falling on his front side.
#6: Absolutely love this composition, the story. Beautiful.
#9: Nice work with this pan

Thank you much for the feedback I have been trying to figure out how to get the back lit image to work well. Was thinking with a gel on a flash for fill or off camera but my shutter speed is around 500 and their movement is to quick to get a sharp image head on at 1/200 sinc for the 5Dii along with the refresh of the flash wont nearly be fast enough for all the riders. I guess in the long run just try to avoid heavy backlighting like that.

I will try and croped version of the second image, Thanks again for the feedback.

Cool set. CX is a blast to shoot. I spent the weekend shooting CX also and I'd be very happy to have captured some of these images.

1. Nice job capturing the moment in a nice shot. It could maybe be cropped just a little more...not sure.
2. I like the angle/concept here but this shot doesn't do it for me. Maybe it's the crop or the light, or the fact that I don't see much of her face. Maybe get lower to minimize the foreground in the frame but keep the cool foreground bokeh and also get a better angle on the face.
3. I actually like this shot! The action and composition work great but the immediate impression is from the backlighting. Just a touch of fill flash might have made a difference. Good job with a tricky exposure here in any case.
4-5. Nice solid shots
6. Epic. Love this light, composition, story, all of it.
7. Girtty CX looks great in BW. Good one.
8-10. Solid shots with different looks. Love the smile on 10...the facial expressions on the riders make for my favorite CX shots.
11-12. These aren't working for me, personally. The remounts can be impressive but it's hard to capture the skill and athleticism that a smooth remount after a climb or barrier requires. It doesn't help that the riders are usually not looking up. The riders might like these captures though.
13. Good one.

I would like to see some of your CX shots I find there are many more possible angles viewing others shots than I have thought of. Thanks for the feedback, I have been trying to figure out a good remount angle maybe close up with a fisheye from below?

Really nice stuff! Can you get enough distance from HSS on your flash (assuming you have a 580ex(2)), to just get a bump of light in the back-lit case? Other option might be if you have pocket wizards with HyperSync, to extend where you can shoot with full power. Just the though (perhaps not a good one).

5/7/8 are my favorites of the set.