On course with the Scott-Swisspower team
Absalon talks about the new course layout
XC Racing
I have joined Handsling Racing for 2012.
Having spent last year building up my creative design business, Born75, and having a new baby (woo hoo!), I’ve been keen to get back into racing again this year to make the most of my 20 years riding experience in cross country MTB races and road races.
I was a key member of the Thames Tradesmen/Velo City team in the 90′s with Simon, Pete and Paul, and raced at every level – regional, national, world cup and world championships, so it’s going to be great being back in a team with those guys – It should be a lot of fun!
This winter I’ve been training to regain the form I had from a few years back that saw me consistently in the top 10 of every race for 4 years. Still a way to go but the intention is strongly there.
And of course, I’m also the mastermind behind the Handsling kit design…
You can follow the team here and also on www.handsling.blogspot.com
Happy 2012 everyone!
Sunday March 28th. British summer time returns, and so does national XC racing with the BMBS. A visit up to Sherwood pines, Nottingham was in order as the first round of racing kicked off alongside the demo series.
The previous day was spent saying hello to old faces, along with some new ones, while also checking out the course. It was fun out there, even though the weather threatened to turn for the worse, some of the single track was good fun and looked to be a good test for some of the riders, particularly through that bomb hole section. Racing in the masters meant that there would be more time to decide on the racing lines and tyre combination for the day, weather dependent of course.
75 riders lined up on the Sunday with 5 laps of the 7km laps ahead of us. I wasn’t in the best of form for the race, having had some illness in the days beforehand, but also, this wasn’t really a race I had down to be firing on. With the gun going off we charged forward through the new feed zone layout, down, across the up the first fire road climb. Dust everywhere! At the top was the right hand turn into the single track. If you weren’t in the first few riders you where hitting queues… and I did, as we ground to a halt. But, thats part of racing, so I just had to deal with it.
It was a fast running course out there, not quite as intense as Black park but still fast, so it wasn’t long before I was dropping the empty bottle to the floor and grabbing a fresh one. By now everyone was into their rhythms and those around me would be with me for the rest of the day. So on I went working away to chase down those up ahead with another guy on my wheel for a lap or so. I figured that I would do a lap, he would lead for another and so on. But he just sat there, then attacked. Thanks for that.
By this point I was well into lap 3. It’s a tough course to ride on your own, you are either flying in a train or you are just floating about a bit, and I then floated for as long as I could. The 4th lap was tough as the early pace began to set in, our race being shaken up a little from getting caught by some of the Vets I think, anyway as the final lap came around the course was getting quieter, which is never a good sign and riding up the fire road climb for the final time I went from about 10mph down in 3 in spectacular fashion. Totally slumped over the bars, back aching, hot, salt covered face and just plain done. Gutted not to finish.
Despite this it was a good weekend and an excellent job was put on to organising the event. I’m looking forward to the next round and seeing an improvement in my results. Full results from the day were done by timelaps and can be found here. Thanks to Joolze for the photos again. Next up is the Southern XC race, then onto Gorrick.
An hour and a half of hard fast racing on a flat but fun course helped to build the condition for later in the year, over at the West Drayton MBC organised event. The race has been running for a few years now, but this was the first time I’d competed, but not the last as it was great fun out in the fast and flowing singletrack, and I will definitely return.
It was the second MTB race of the year, and I was looking to improve upon the last race, while getting in some good quality, no pressure training. Lining up in the decent sized combined sport and masters race, I finally got to meet Langers and the UK Biking riders before we set out on 7 laps of the 3 mile course. I knew it was going to be a very fast race given the nature of the terrain and figured it best to go out hard and keep going as long as I could. It wasn’t the type of course where it was easy to close a gap once they had been formed.
Off the start we went along the main stretch before a couple of left turns lead into the first singletrack section, it seemed like I was in around 20th spot, seems I wasn’t the only one. After the initial rush things began settling down somewhat as everyone got into their rhythms I found myself with one of the host riders, Stephen Tebbet, and we began working our way round the course together. It felt like the kind of race where you could see the actual fitness levels of the riders, compared to other races, such as Gorrick, which require more of a fitness/skills balance. Anyway, we worked together for a few laps, sharing the load and making sure we stayed a tight unit as we covered the laps in around 15 – 16 minutes.
Keeping count of which lap I was on was becoming a problem as it was all happening pretty fast, but that wasn’t the only issue I found. Finding spots to drink was proving tricky and noticed that I wasn’t really taking in much liquid, something which I would surely pay for later, especially as it was the first warmer day all winter. Round and round we went, until eventually I began to slowly lose contact with Stephen as he gradually pulled away.
I think I had a lap or 2 remaining so just kept my head down and carried on, as it was a fast course it was easy to maintain a decent speed, but went through the usual roller coaster of red lining it. A few minutes feeling bad, coming round to being strong again, only to dip again, then have the strength return. I see this as a good thing as it showed me that I was doing my utmost. I managed to finish on a strong point, were I seemed to recover fully for the final couple of km’s to cross the line in 12th spot. Much higher up the field than I thought so was satisfied with the day.
Results from all the races are here. Next on the agenda is a week training camp, followed by the first round of the BMBS.
It’s the day after the first round of the series, which looked like it was a big success and is great for the UK scene. I’m going to be writing up my report when I get a few minutes break, so expect to see it around Wednesday.
The first race of the year is always full of uncertainties. Am I on a good day? Have I done enough training? Was it the right kind? Is the bike set up properly? How have the competition spent their time? The answers tend to show a couple of races into the season, and I don’t think too much importance should really be placed on the result of one day, unless its your main goal of the year. For me this was a good chance to test the condition and get back into the swing of racing. I’ve already competed in a short road race, but given that it’s easy to hitch a ride in the bunch, I’ve discounted this as a performance indicator, fun as it was.
So onto Crowthorne woods for round three of the Gorrick Saddle Skedaddle Spring Series. Checking out the course as part of my warm up I found a fairly flat course with lots of the usual singletrack broken up by short sections of fire road and a couple of short climbs. Conditions were fast and cold (-4 when we arrived. -4!!) as I covered the 5.8km course in a fairy gentle 25mins.
Lining up in the super masters I got a pretty good position on the second row of 39 riders, as we set off racing over four laps. As the horn went off and we all scrambled to get over the crest of the rise and down the hill, I ran into a little trouble in the shape of a wobbly rider in front of me, which delayed me getting into the pedals and getting going. Just a couple of seconds delay here and the race was already heading down the first hill, and out onto the course.
200 metres into the race the bulk of the field was 100 metres up the road and pulling away. It was pretty clear this would be a day for me to test out my ability to ride through a field as I set a pace that seemed fast enough to be gaining ground, but steady enough to see it through to the end. But no race is without problems so I wasn’t going to complain about it.
The first couple of laps passed pretty quickly as I cut through to somewhere in the late teens. It was pretty difficult to judge exactly where I was with multiple races going on at the same time, so passing by the start finish I kept my ears alert to the commentary – 19th I think I heard. With the legs feeling positive, feeling the enjoyment of the course, and knowing I had cut through half the field I set onto lap 3. By this time the race was well settled into its place, with the gaps between us all pretty much set, so gaining anymore places was going to be difficult. Now it was perhaps about maintaining a good rhythm, drinking often and getting over that finish line with the placing in tack.
Only it didn’t really turn out that way.
Somewhere around halfway I started to run out of gas, perhaps paying the price of my first lap chasing, actually, it probably was. Now it definitely was a case of maintaining position and holding off that feeling of the world closing in on you. Riders began coming past and I had nothing to respond with. Just focus and keep your own rhythm was the phrase I repeated over and over. The fog continued on, as I continued to drift.
I the began to gain a sense of clarity again as I headed to the end of the final lap – only 10 mins to go, stay focused. Keep going.
Then I got caught. Again. This time I stepped up to hold pace with the group of 4 until the finish, the two stronger riders got away in the last couple of minutes but I managed to get a gap on the remaining racer going through that final loop.
I crossed the line in 24th. I’d dropped 5 places!
Disappointing at the time, it’s never good to hit the wall, even if it is manageable. But I’m not too unhappy really as I’m months away from my goal for the year, and as I mentioned at the start, its only one race, the first race. So with that in mind, I headed off home and got myself prepared for the next days training session and next weekends WDMBC race at Black park.
Thanks to Joolze for the photography.
The recent bad weather across the country has meant that there is good news and there is bad news. Ok, bad news first, the first race of the year has had to be postponed. The good news? Its now going to be on May 16th. Any entries that had been made for round one can be moved to any other round as long as you contact the gorrick team. If you don’t contact them then you have an entry to the May 16th event.
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