Nae hill's at Sherwood!

Getting back into racing certainly does pack a punch and already the whirlwind of last weeks race and a 40km TT midweek left me slightly weary! Sherwood pines is about a 4 and a half hour journey for me so I guess its not too bad! However it just seemed to take an age to get down there and I was proper tired by the time we arrived. It was time for a quick kit change and a practice lap. There is one thing that you always know about Sherwood Pines, it's gonna be flat and it's gonna be fast and yep that pretty much sums up the lap. After the lap it was time to get some food and find the travel lodge.



The travel lodge was about half and hour away and did the trick for the night. They even allowed me to take my bike into the room, which actually allowed me to get some sleep during the night . . . . . . not waking up every 5mins to peep through the curtains! All I had to do was remember to switch my clock to go off an hour earlier! :)



Sunday arrived, my phone managed to change the time by itself (it's just amazing living in the 21st century) and everything was going nicely to plan. The race was tough from start to finish 5 laps of flat out effort with very little recovery out there. I finished 13th pretty happy with that result to be honest!

Other Glentress riders were out in force as usual with Katy Winton taking 2nd in the Junior females, Lewis Kirkwood 6th in the Junior males and Hannah Ferguson taking 4th in the Youth females. Nice one guys!

A few weeks off now to train like a beast for Dalby

Yee ha

Les

That's Life!

The racing season has defiantly crept up on me with a bit of a bang this year. I'm not sure if it's to do with the weird winter we have just experienced where lets face it, biking became a little tricky and my skills have been used more in the sports of snowman making and extreme sledging (not for the faint hearted!), but I'm just not really sure where the time has gone. So now its March and the start of the SXC season . . . . . . . . here we go again.

Most of Saturday morning was spent by me running around like a headless chicken, not quite fully remembering what I required to race, blatantly packing way too much stuff and in the end being content that I knew I had a bike, shoes, shorts, top, helmet and gloves and lets face it anything else was just going to be a bonus! Did I mention how sweeet my new race bike is??? Check it out below:

So off Kerry and I set for Kirroughtree and our first road trip of the season. All went according to plan and we arrived around 3pm in the afternoon. I popped off for a quick scoot around the race route and once again was more than happy with what Kirroughtree had to offer, actually it was even a bit better than last year as more sections of fire-track road had been taken out and replaced with natural sections - now we are talking! After a quick lap it was back to the B&B ( http://www.muirfadbedandbreakfast.co.uk) to chill-ax before the race the next day. Muirfad is one of Kerry and I's favourite places to stay when we are travelling around, Sue and Basil always make you feel very welcome in their home, it you are ever over that way you should definitely pop in and see them.

On Sunday morning everything felt good and I was really excited about getting out onto the race to see how everything was going. The race went really well up to the last lap where unfortunately I got a puncture, after a bit of faffing and a dodgy gas canister I eventually finished, coming in 6th, not quite what I was hoping for on the day but just makes me even more hungry for the next SXC! Sue Clarke took the win, with Lee Craigie 2nd and Elke Schmidt 3rd.

Fellow Glentress Riders Hannah Ferguson and Lewis Kirkwood got 3rd in their categories. Graeme Short finished 18th in the Vets.

British XC next week

Yee ha

Les