LOL, I saw the goldfish! (crackers) The guy who took them was hysterical! The goldfish exploded and he just shoved what he could into his face! The cash and hand-ups are all part of the cheering/heckling of the sport. Go to Youtube and look up some CX footage and you'll find both hand-ups and heckling is pretty normal and traditional. Here's a guy getting pelted with Donuts. It is CX, Heckling and cheering are one and the same. Don't take it so seriously and enjoy yourself. You probably don't remember it, but I believe that you are talking about the same guy with the apple, the dollar bills and the cowbell.

Someone took my daughter's banana handup, but no one would take my beer. My race (the one before yours) nor the earlier ones didn't seem to have all the antics or hand-ups that the Mens Cat 4 race had. Then again, the earlier races only had a fraction of the racers that your race had. In my race, there was only one guy wanting a high-five but didn't give me enough time to react. By the time I processed it, I was several meters past him.

The heckling is all in fun, and no one is forcing you to take anything. Frankly if you do, it will probably just bog you down, but it will make you a crowd favorite. As for the money, yeah that's typical. A buddy of mine made 6 bucks at the HH with cash pickups. He knows that that's the only money that he's going to make in the sport, and is perfectly happy with it. Word is that some guy in CO does cash pickups with $100 bills.

Ride at your pace, race how you want, but remember to have fun. It's the most important part of this sport.