National Championships

Following the midweek shock of finding myself 5th in the national rankings I was eager to consolidate the position with a strong ride at the national championships. After picking up Adam on route, we met up with Frank and Paul from inverse/bikefood racing team and Luke Bowman for a practice lap. The course felt relatively long and with about 8km of far from flat terrain it was going to be a tough outing.

Before the start there wasn't the usual buzz which accompanies a national race. Because most of the big races were on the Sunday, there were less spectators, less riders in the arena and, seemingly less organisation. In this respect, at least, the event was a bit of an anti-climax and felt more like a normal southern than the pinnacle of the xc racing season.

After a brief dash across the field, the course entered a fast windy descent so I knew getting into the woods near the front was vital if I wanted to limit my time loss. It normally suits me to start slowly and get into a rhythm but in this case I hoped I could use the descent to recover from the early effort. I hit the singletrack in 3rd, and only lost a couple of places on the next fireroad climb. For most of the first lap, I think 3rd to 10th were all pretty much nose to tail and it took some rapid climbing by Mark Bains and Mike Rudling to separate the pack. By the midway point of the second lap the group was down to myself and Luke, with a couple of guys not far behind. The turning point for my race was conquering the short slippery climb and sharp left hander, Luke wasn't so fortunate and I made the most of the gap that appeared and kicked hard, working to the philosophy of 'out of sight, out of mind,' I wanted to get at least on corner ahead. From this point on it was just a solo tt to the finish. The only other sport rider I saw was a stricken James Sanford who was forced to abandon after a puncture.

I crossed the line in 4th place, my best result in a ranking race to-date and more importantly, it felt like a pretty strong ride. Post race analysis revealed my prediction of a tough race was vindicated, with a lot of riders feeling cramp in the later stages. Overall, probably my favourite course of the season and should hopefully help my target of promotion for next year.