Apparently I didn't learn anything in my fourth race last year. Actually, now that I think back I did learn this: riding hard does not keep your fingers warm. If it's below 35 degrees, use long fingered gloves.
Now back to this year. I've already got one race under my belt, and so I'm adding a couple of new things.
1. If it's hot, wear something to keep the sweat out of your eyes. There was a moment this week when I was heading down a hill into an off-camber turn and I absolutely could not see because of the sweat pouring into my eyes. That really sucked.
2. Don't fall off the back of the pack if you can avoid it. As long as you're with the group, you'll push yourself to stay with them. Once you're by yourself, you have no reference point for judging your effort and you'll probably be going slower than you realize.
3. Brake late and hard. There was one section of the course this week that had a fast downhill approach to an uphill U-turn. Consistently, I was catching up to people in this turn who had been 30+ yards ahead of me at the top of the hill, and I was just coasting down the hill. The only thing I can figure is that they were braking early and going into the turn slowly. I went in fast and braked hard just before I needed to start turning.
4. If you can't breath slow down before attempting barriers. Crossing a barrier, and especially multiple barriers, requires fine motor skills and coordination. Those things disappear as you approach max heart rate. I discovered that this week after sprinting up an incline and coming fast into a set of three barriers. I tried to hop off my bike and run the barriers just like I'd been practicing -- except I was out of control and planted the front tire firmly into the second barrier. Every lap after that, I slowed down and took this set of barriers more slowly. It didn't look cool, but I think it was probably faster.
5. Be aggressive. If you never lose control of the bike, you could probably be going faster. This one I actually realized just a couple of days ago. In five races, I haven't had my bike hit the ground once. Generally, that's good, but I realized that I've been extremely cautious in a lot of places where I'm sure I could do better if I took a little more risk.