Race 15: 10 Mile Roadie Time Trial, Sheriff Hutton, 31/05/2012

This was my first attempt at a roadie time trial. It was a hilly 10 mile circuit from Sheriff Hutton, near York, up Bulmer Bank, to Terrington Bank and back. When I arrived I found it quite funny that there were people with pointy hats and others warming up on turbo trainers on the grass verge. I wasn't expecting the local cycling clubs race to be so serious!

I was starter number 25 of 28 as I arrived at the time on the sheet and it turns out other people arrived 40 mins early to get a good spot! Everyone was cycling around warming up so I did too. I did the climb up to Sheriff Hutton and then wandered off down the back road to nip to the loo in a field. Big mistake! I forgot about the roadie cleats. I tried to get back on the bike and the cleats were completely full of mud (the field had been ploughed). I had a couple of mins to my start time and I couldn't get clipped in! I zoomed back to the start area and one of the other later starters kindly fixed one shoe whilst I did the other and we cleared out all the mud with keys. Oops.



Similar!

 So I made it to the line all clipped in and was amused that at 30 secs to go I had to get clipped in whilst someone held me upright, then I got a push off when it was time to go. Probably a bit of overkill for me I thought!

The first descent was fine, I got to 38mph so happy with that, the 30% climb up Bulmer Bank was fine too until the man behind overtook me! I thought that was a little early to be overtaken, after about 5 mins! But it was a fast bloke (Jamie Sharp) who apparently wins every time trial, including this one, so that was fine. I have to say, he climbed the hill like it wasn't there, I was puffing and panting and heaving my way up and he danced past me like it was flat! I thought I was done with the climbing but it turns out that it's a climb all the way to Terrington, that was only the start of it. I wasn't happy about that but settled down and wasn't too shabby. I could see my man in front and I was gaining on him. The big descent down Terrington bank was pretty fast, max speed was 45mph, the flat until the hilltop finish was OK for me too. The hilltop finish was uncomfortable but I made it up there and was glad that it was over!

Summary

Distance:	10.76 mi
Time:	34:00 mins
Elevation Gain:	797 ft
Avg Speed: Max Speed:	18.99 mph 45 mph
Avg Cadence:	76 rpm
Max Cadence:	130 rpm
Avg HR: Max HR:	178 bpm 210 bpm

Race 14: Brownbacks XC, Round 1, 26/05/2012

I hadn't forgotten how tough these races are but I did remember all over again! It was a blisteringly hot 24 degrees in Lee Quarry. Very nice for a sunbathe, not so good for a cross country race.. We are now the proud owners of a camper van! So we stayed around the corner at a cricket club of all places, and that meant no early start, it was so much nicer than getting up at the crack of dawn. That always throws me out before I've even started - not good at early mornings!

New camper!

We temporarily misplaced the camper keys so did not get time to do any warm up at all (They turned up in the pocket of my shorts, how odd!). So it was straight to the start line. I thought some of the girls looked quite nippy when I scanned my competition, a couple of them were too. One girl was off and straight away I could see I was battling for 2nd place. The course had its usual long climb on the first lap. It always half kills me and today was no exception! Heart rate zero to max in about 5 seconds. after that it was up and down continuously for 90 mins. Lots of near vertical but short drops and near vertical but short climbs too. The longer quite hairy rocky descent was in it, as was the longer rocky climb. And a rock path that went around a corner, I thought I might fall off that when I got tired but luckily did not. The whole thing took quite a lot of concentration and was tiring because there was hardly anywhere to gather yourself and eat a gel.

I was 2nd for a while but a girl slipped by me. She was faster through the technical parts and I caught her on the climbs each time. I stayed with her for the first two laps but then wondered if I was going to make 90 mins so eased off slightly. I thought maybe she'd get tired towards the end. I lost sight of her for ages and when I got the bell my legs were all nicely warmed up so I decided to go for it. I caught up 44 secs on her in that last lap. It came down to the final climb! I was closing in but was pretty trashed after doing the last lap almost a minute faster than my next fastest lap. I caught her just as the climb steepened and I started to pull alongside for a final sprint past right to the line, but she saw me and pushed harder and I couldn't do it! She beat me by 3 secs. A most excellent race!!!

My step seems very low, or maybe the other two are just tall!

Race 13: Etape Du Dales, Road Sportive, 20/05/2012

This is a big ride at 110 miles with 10,000 ft climbing. I haven't done any big road rides this year so wondered how much this would hurt! I remember last year when it was raining and freezing cold and I got plastic bags from the food stations and wore them as gloves and socks. So this year I came prepared, with hand and feet disposable warmers, arms and knee warmers, gillet, raincoat, full fingered gloves etc. And it was boiling! I had nowhere to put all my clothes. The climb up to Tan Hill was very sunny and warm. I couldn't fit everything in my pockets so wore my knee and arm warmers very stylishly around my ankles and wrists.

The first 50 miles I wondered what was wrong because I had zero get up and go. Miles 50 - 70 and my eyes kept closing like when you are really tired driving along a motorway. So I realised what the problem was, a severe lack of sleep was to blame. Gill gave me a Torq Banoffee guana gel and I drank Emerge (a still isotonic drink with vitamin B in) at the next food stop. 10 mins later I was properly perked up! I'm getting some of that drink in for next time I'm suffering.

The last 40 miles were much more pleasant. It is a charity ride and there are four food stops, which I very much enjoyed. Cakes, sandwiches and a cup of tea at Tan Hill was my highlight. The company was most excellent too. And the nice scenery of the Dales, because we were ambling along I got a lot of time to have a look and it really is beautiful.

News: British MTBO Team for World Championships

Posted: 13/05/12

After the final selection race in Cropton Forest today the following riders have been selected for the British Elite Team (M21/W21/M18)

Men:
Ian Nixon
Andrew Douglas
Chris Brand-Barker

Women:
Pippa Archer
Emily Benham
Steph Fountain

Junior:
Edwyn Oliver-Evans

This is subject to all athletes confirming their wish to ride, prior to entries been submitted through BMBO/BOF.

This year the Championships are in Hungary from 20th August and coincides with the Masters Championships.

The selectors wish all of the riders good luck.

(http://www.bmbo.org.uk/news/article.php?news_id=178)

Race 12: MTBO Sprint, Czech Republic, 07/05/2012

I think John Rawdon has done something really bad because it was always sunny in Czech Republic until the moment he went to the start tapes. For three days running the heavens opened and it rained like crazy the moment he got there. When I was doing the world cup that was fine because I'd finished my race ages ago, but today my start time was unfortunately 2 mins after John. We got to the start tape and the heavens opened. I had my red cap on under my helmet, looking very stylish, to try and keep the rain off my glasses.

The cap was great at stopping the rain, but brushing past trees was a bit of an issue and if I got up any speed the muddy water from the ground absolutely covered them. So vision was a little sketchy. I had to wipe the map board every time I needed to look at it and peer through the rain to see what was there, but it was just about OK.

I kept seeing John, thought I was gaining on him but then he disappeared and I thought he had given me the slip. But unfortunately he'd gone wrong, probably through not being able to see.

The route was good, it went through the forest a bit and into the village. There wasn't much urban, which was probably a good thing because the roads were the worst for rain. As soon as we'd finished the sun came back out!

Race 11: MTBO World Cup, Middle Race, Czech Republic, 06/05/2012

Today's world cup race could well of been my hardest from a navigation point of view. The 1st half was an absolute nightmare! I spent it feeling a little bit confused. I never got any flow, there were lots of dotty tracks that I could only see as a blur of dots when I was cycling along. I was glad to see that it wasn't just me, there were plenty of elite girls carrying their bikes to the correct tracks.

A weird thing happened at the start, I couldn't see the track in front of the start triangle on the map. I aligned the map to north but it wasn't there, I checked a few more times and then it was time to go so I went left as I'd seen the other girls all go that way. I was all confused though and it took me a couple of minutes to work out what was going on. It turned out that my compass was almost 90 degrees out on the start! We later worked out it's because of my big watch right next to it. Never wearing that watch again! What a nightmare..
The riding was pretty good, we went down a downhill track for part of it! I did one of the smaller jumps by accident but took the chicken run around the other obstacles!

This race tested my navigation skills and with all the elite riders around me for extra pressure it made it quite hard! I did OK though apart from the strange thing at the start and one other control where I couldn't see the way so I changed and went around a different way. A bit more foot-o (as we don't have many MTBO races around York) and I'll be climbing the leader board a bit more I think :-)





Race 10, MTBO World Cup Long, Czech Republic, 05/05/2012

I was surprised at how unstressful the world cup was. It was just like every other race really. I got an earlyish start so I didn't even have to go in quarantine. There was a practice course by the start so I did a bit of that whilst I was waiting. I did get nervous when I walked up at my start time, then there are the 3 mins in the tapes to wait before you can go. I struggled to get my map on the board because it was an A4 stapled to an A3. I had to fold the A 3 to get the right part I needed and the other map was flapping around. Anyway, it took me the whole minute to get it on so when the beeper went I hadn't looked at my route to number 1 yet! Luckily the start flag was around the corner so by the time I'd got there I'd quickly worked it out.

John in the start tapes

I usually mess up number 1 when I'm nervous, but today was OK. It was number 2 instead! I was calming myself down but must have still been a bit frantic because I missed the turning, realised when I could see an open field, and tried to turn around, but my chain fell off at the back and the front! I got that back on then missed a turn on the tracks so had to go back to the road to sort out what I'd done wrong. That was my mistake. After that I was relaxed and the rest of it went without any errors to speak of.

Map 1

The course seemed relatively easy in that there were no really tricky bits and the bulk of the distance could be done on fire roads before nipping in to the dotty tracks to get the controls. Yesterday in the model event we found that you can't navigate by saying next left or 3rd right, because the smaller tracks can be completely not there. Sometimes if you looked hard enough you could kind of tell that the grass was a bit flatter than the rest so that was a track, but if you didn't know exactly where to look you'd never see it. So we had to use everything else to know where the tracks were; shape of the land, tree thickness, fences etc. luckily there was always something to give it away today.

Map 2

I found it pretty hard going and my chain was making a noise. It fell off twice more! I didn't seem to be able to back pedal at all. I thought my legs must be still tired from last weekends adventure race so I had 2 gels and pedalled as hard as I could. When I got back the boys looked at my bike and someone noticed my chain wasn't on the bottom jockey wheel! When we looked it wasn't on either jockey wheel, it was running on the plastic at the side. The jockey wheels were pushed right over against the edge. The carbon wheel part had come away from the ceramic housing. So much for ultimate bearings! I couldn't believe that I'd done my first proper world cup race without jockey wheels and I also couldn't believe I didn't notice what was wrong!

Oops!