Hello! I will be racing Welsh League too.

I assume you’re in S Wales – whereabouts? There’s a CX training group on Monday nights in Cardiff, come along if you are nearby.

If you can’t get there, that consists of stuff like dismount/remount/carrying practice, sprints/practice starts, and usually finishes with a 10 minute race round a mini CX circuit – much easier to replicate race pace efforts with some ‘friendly’ competition.

I’ll be doing select LondonCX league events dotted around the South East and Raphas SuperCross (I might even to the Munich one) events.
I’m doing (cough) the 3Peaks having got in by chance, also continue doing my favorite long distance CX sportives (Lakeland MonsterX etc.)

Training, yes always. Sprint training recently, intervals and stretching these out to HITs giving me the sHITs. My club have some training sessions set up soon and I’ll be doing those as I need to improve my short course technique.

Bike, my Giant TCX Adv1. Upgrades a new Zipp 120mm stem & 40cm Zipp SL bars fitted last weekend, ProLogo NacTT seat fitted too, can’t chose between a carbon wheelset I’ve identified yet and this is causing a headache (ridiculous I know) Tyres, using Challenge Almanzos ATM as it’s super dry but will revert back to Griffos and Limus when the course (s) require it.

8)

Good stuff! You’re right that it’s very important to be able to dismount, carry and mount smoothly. That way, you can still keep moving even on bits you can’t ride and you’ll hardly lose any time to guys who struggle on in the saddle. Watching vids of pro races is always good for inspiration and learning – check out the ‘Svenness’ and ‘likeaVos’ series on vimeo too, where there’s a bit of added commentary to give some insight into what’s going on.
Most importantly, good luck and have fun!

Poss the odd race but I’m hosting the final round of Western League as part of the Lovecrossed weekend. Saturday will see 4crossed: 4hrs, teams of 4 over a slightly longer course. More details to come!

I’ll be on me tod in Helsinki from September – December. There’s a low key CX race series there, which, as a billy-no-mates who’s taking his cross-type bike over, sounds ideal!

Full season of racing for me this time around after a late start last season due to injury.
Notts and Derby league primarily with selected Trophies and the Nationals on top.
Commissairing an area champs, a Trophy and day 1 of the Nationals.

Bikes all ready bar gluing the tubs on, team training has been going for a few weeks and we’re all raring to go 😀

After the summer break the MTB marathon races kick off again in September with the traditional end of season race on The German Day of Unity (October 3). Then a couple of weeks wait and then the cross season starts on the 18 October in these parts (it’s called the Bioracer Challenge Cup) with 8 rounds this year. Hoping to get my new cross bike together in time (Crux pro) for the end of September as there is one local MTB marathon that is much quicker on a cross bike! 😈

Wessex Cyclo-Cross League for me

http://www.wessexcx.co.uk

Bring it on!!

Ill be trying to do more this year as did nothing last year.

Sadly all the interesting North East courses seem to have been dropped by CXNE this year, racing round fields gets boring pretty quick. NECCL rounds look a bit more interesting, some new venues too.

You can’t have bottles or gels handed up anywhere unless it’s very hot and the commissaire team allow it.
The vast majority of people go without, it’s only 50-65 mins after all. Bottle cages are a nightmare for carrying the bike effectively, especially if you’re small, and at the sharp end skinsuits are the norm so there’s nowhere for a gel anyway.

I should hope you can, it’s only an hour max! Assuming late morning/lunchtime start, fuelling through the morning sees me through just fine. Some folk ride with bottles but I can’t be doing with them for the reasons Lee says. I’m not one for drinking on the bike in anything lasting less than an hour anyway (possibly because ‘cross has made me used to riding like that), and if I’ve properly buried myself then I usually feel too sick to eat at the end of a ‘cross race for 20-30 mins 😈

i’ll be doing a few of the western league races round brizzle. Having a now 8 month old baby has put paid to any sort of training 🙁 I’m just permanently tired

Getting in as many of the North West league races in as I can this year (will miss a couple with previous engagements/hill climbs). Last year was my first ‘full’ league (ie enough races to get an overall place) and it was bloody brilliant. Really can’t wait to get stuck in again 🙂

(Oh and fuelling/drinking wise – don’t bother carrying anything, you probably won’t have time to use it. I carried the same “emergency” gel around in my jersey for the whole season last year!)

Ah but you’ll be able to keep up by using your 46 ring, which as we all know you absolutely NEED to be able to compete 😆 😉

Is there much CX is surrey ? I see lots in the surrounding counties, but nothing much local to surrey specifically… Don’t get alot of travel time unfortunately 🙁
Currently doing alot of XC locally (gorrick), but fancied something abit different

@trickydisco – same for me in the Western League, although with 3 month old twins… I’ve almost forgotten what a bike is but still going to try and make it to as many rounds as possible.

I’m astonished by how fast some of the Bristol CX guys got during the summer series (not that they weren’t fast before…). I’ll be the not fast guy racing for Bristol CX (well, I always was, but even less fast this season).

Yes, Andy Burridge really caned the training this year. He was on fire towards the end of the season

I don’t normally link to other sites but there are two that maybe of help to those wishing to improve for the season..

Cycle-Smart Knowledge Page

and closer to home these guys..

Fluent in Cross..