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Good grief. 33 of 44 my worst result. Wtf is going on...
Looks nice Ferrals. Are you designing the course?
As much as we can, working with what's there then need to discuss with land owner about new trails. Will need to build a bit I think
Major aim of 2016 achieved - podium at TIYS. 100hrs (25%)of training down on 2015 due to house move/injury/illness but a lot of lessons/racecraft picked up in the preceding 2 years was a big help. Did take a huge amount of willpower not to pack in from 7hrs on despite pacing very carefully.
No desire to do anything long again this season so plan is to do some XC before base. This is going to be interesting as all my training has been geared to 6hrs plus. People I beat over 6hrs nearly lap me at XC.....
Anybody doing Shouldham 6hr Enduro tomorrow?
Really looking forward to it this year just a shame it's rained all day today.
I did last year. It was a good course, did it on my fatty 😆
Sadly not riding tomorrow. It's still very wet where I am (about 20miles away) 🙁
I remember you on the fatty, looked hard going.
It's meant to be dry in the morning, it does dry out quick other than the far bottom loamy section
I got a dressing down yesterday, mainly caused by my explanation of 3 months "dry" during my base/build to Christmas. "For gods sake man, your not a pro, you have a job two kids and ride 6hrs a week, just ride/race your bike and enjoy it, and have a beer Ffs".
🙁
They have a point. Three months dry is no bad thing health wise, but despite cx season starting for me next weekend I still have a hang-over today (admittedly I wouldn't if I was planning a hard training session today). It's easy to get caught up in 'training' but I'm trying to go by the approach of train as hard as I can but not at the expense of fun.
Indeed. Maybe I've gone a bit too far - I can get my week turbo sessions in, a Sunday ride and have a couple of beers Friday to break the monotony.
Related to the CX as training thread, I just want to be better bur maybe have to except my place on life's rungs of the ladder and not get silly about it.
Xc rampage today at Checkendon. Its my 8 year olds debut race. Just loading him up with porridge and raisins!
Sadly due to crashing I'm not even sure I can get in the car let alone race after him.
Well that didn't go to plan at all. We turned up and signed on etc. Then sent the boy out on a warm up lap to work out the course. Only after a few mins realising he'd gone off on the adult course which was 3 miles or so, oops.
Mrs Weeksy was beside herself with worry, but the boy made it back OK eventually. With 9 minutes to spare before his age race.
Lined up on the grid at the front and flew off the line, slotted into 2nd place.. Up the first hill and holding his own, went for an overtake but the kid was moving out and my lad touched his wheel, no problem, they disappeared into the woods, so a waiting game then. Eventually the leader came through, I was shocked it wasn't my lad. Then the next 10 came through, uh oh. Eventually my boy came out, sobbing. Oh dear. He'd binned it on a technical feature and hurt himself. Result DNF.
Sadly, or happily he was still in 2nd place when he crashed, so obviously was running a decent pace.
Massive thanks to Crosshair who took him back out on the course so he could practice the feature he crashed on and gave him some pointers for next time.
He's a bit scuffed and bruised but in decent spirits.
but in decent spirits.
Which is the main thing - I'm sure next time he'll be a bit more savvy
Good on him for keeping positive. Lots to learn in xc. I'm sure his next race will go well given his pace.
My lot were 4th in girls u9 and 6th in boys u11. Notably they were disappointed to find the massive hammock had been removed.
Good on him for keeping positive
+1
At least his Dad didn't enter him in the incorrect age group yesterday, denying him the podium he would have got if he'd raced in it. What an idiot that bloke is...
Well Shouldham Enduro all done, we got 3rd place in Male pairs, my first podium so over the moon.
Course wasn't overly technical but physically it was very tough, slippy mud and loads roots to keep you on your toes.
Also at Checkendon. No punch off the line and some astonishingly bad bike handling under pressure. I did however enjoy myself a lot!
I am so bad at XC I may concentrate on it next season. How can I be so bad at a shorter version of what I do ok at?
It's different under pressure / at HR max. As you've seen by my 6h effort I went the opposite.
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My lad on the end on the right as looking at pic
It's different under pressure / at HR max
Ain'the that right! Passed someone on lap 3. Got more tired, he gained, the more I heard him gain, the more ragged my riding. All he had to do was wait for me to fall off.
2017 national dates announced
[url= https://www.britishcycling.org.uk/mtb/article/20160919-mountain-bike-British-Cycling-names-venues-and-dates-for-2017-British-Cycling-MTB-Cross-Country-Series--national-championships-and-marathon-championships-0 ]BC website[/url]
Hope to make at least two or three
Can anyone join in at the back? Not sure what the qualification is.
Anyone can enter open, you need a proper race license for the ability/open cats. Then its just gridded on series standing.
I really enjoyed all the nationals this year - although mainly because the fields are so small in Wales its nice to have more to race against.
Ok. I have a full license, so I just enter open and join he back if the grid (I won't be racing the series). Might do a couple then.
Last race of the "season" for me in Sunday, currently sitting 26th Eastern league and should maintain that or go up 1 or two if I have a good race. That's 7 places better than last year, lack of chest infections etc no doubt have helped.
Due to my shoulder issues limiting the amount of time I can ride its XCO only for the next 12 months, at least it's a focused training plan this year. And Battle on the beach of course.
Has anyone gone for the "Do you know what I won't contest the starting sprint on purpose" strategy?
The reason I'm wondering is my weekend training ride was 1.6kmph faster, 16w more powerful yet 1 HR zone lower that the race 2 weeks before. Obviously it didn't have a 0-HRmax start...
I'm guessing your training ride didnt have other riders impeding your progress when ou got to the bits you were good at though?
Also I think my HR is higher than it should be for percieved effort when racing due to the adrenaline of competition. I used my Hr to guage effort and pace myself on Sunday and was left thinking I could have gone a lot arder.
Also I find that whatever position I'm in by half way round the first lap is more or less my position at the end. Not being held up is too crucial in xc. I am rubbish at starting but I've only once not tried to go all out (Dalby this year when I was convinced there would be a big crash going over the roller out of the arena).
2017 national dates announced
Wasing should be good for the Nationals, it's a pretty good course there usually.
It'd be nice to race there twice next year if the Southern XC lot are holding a round there as well.
Dalby this year when I was convinced there would be a big crash going over the roller out of the arena
To be fair there was a crash over that roller just in front of me!
I'm hoping that by the start of next season I'll have bought myself a new race bike, very tempted by the Orbea Oiz. Any other suggestions for full suss race bikes would be appreciated! (although avoid things like an Anthem, I just find them a bit boring)
Has anyone gone for the "Do you know what I won't contest the starting sprint on purpose" strategy?The reason I'm wondering is my weekend training ride was 1.6kmph faster, 16w more powerful yet 1 HR zone lower that the race 2 weeks before. Obviously it didn't have a 0-HRmax start...
As ferrals said, can't compare HR between a training/competition ride - thats why a 30min test is used for FTP/LTHR rather than 60min - adrenaline allows you to go a little harder during a race.
As to pacing, ask yourself if you are a strong descender or not.
If you are, then you need to get the strong start in to get ahead of any mincers that may hold you up. If not, then nothing really to lose by a more even pacing strategy.
I'm hoping that by the start of next season I'll have bought myself a new race bike ...
Depends on how much you want to spend! I'm a massive Scott fan so would struggle to see past that.
XC's taking a back seat for me next year, its looking like there won't be a regional series by me and impending fatherhood means i wont have training or travel time so I'm just going to do a couple of the Nationals and ride my bike for fun - which will make a change as this year every ride has had a training goal. And to be fair I'll probably not do any worse than I've done this year with structured training and 10 races 😳
I'm very average at everything, except when in confident mood I have a good start/finish sprint over 100m. But after the start I'm fading off the top 20 pdq.
I know I'm red lining at the start, I just wondered if I calmed it a bit I'd be faster over the course of the race. I guess the time to try that is in the C races over winter.
Depends on how much you want to spend!
The Orbea I've looked at is £4k so with a reasonable (~20%) deposit I can get that on finance for a pretty comfortable amount/month.
My only complaint about the Spark is that I've got 2 mates that have got one (one 650b, one 29er) so I don't want to look like I'm just copying them!
Shallow I know...
But do they have the 2017 version? if not you aren't copying you are out-doing!!
Haha that's not a bad shout, I've not really looked at how much the 2017 models are though.
BMC Fourstroke????
Dalby's a good example. At the Nutcracker I was off the line in the top 3 and then deliberately drifted back to about 10th as I assumed that those in front would be waaaay ahead of me by the end and I had no need to impede them and those who wern't should have tried harder. Nice relaxing ride through the singletrack in a queue to get the heart rate back down and I don't feel it affected my race. Not being fit enough did that for me.
If I'd tried to stay in the top 3 it would have blown me to bits and I'd have felt bad about possibly obstructing the front runners unnecessarily. If I could have ridden for a Top 10 myself I'd have gone for it.
Phew. I'm glad thats over. The final Mud, Sweat and Gears Eastern round today was a Langdon hills - the clue being in the name. As soon as I rode the practise lap I knew this would be a bogey round for me - a 3.5 mile consisting of climb after climb after climb, ending the lap with - guess what - a bigger climb! Ok there was some pretty sweet single track going down between the climbs but is seems to be over in a flash. So, not being strong at hills was to be a disadvantage.
The start was a grassy ramp to flat, around a bend and up a - you guessed it - steep climb, around another corner and up another climb, then into an A line descent with some pretty tasty steps to jump off. I didn't get my desired starting position as I was ordered by a Comm to start on the "outside" and I want to be inside, then again I messed up by failing to clip in properly, "sprinting" the first ramp up off the start as a single leg drill, before getting onto the flat and clipped in for a second bite at the cherry and made some places.
Then, its was suffering until then end, with the final climb of the final lap pretty much at walking pace with 34/40 only at my disposal - I was glad to see the chequered flag TBH. I did have a dice with my peers of league table position - one suffered more than me and I beat him by the end of the penultimate lap, the other pulled away on the climbs. My final placing not flattered by a low turn out 30th of 35.
Good to see Gaz resplendent in purple Oakley Jawbreakers 🙂
Anyway., its been a fantastic mostly-dry series, just need better legs for next year. I'm off to blow the dust of my bike, which as I discovered when I got home the rear wheel wasn't tightened up, thank god for through-axles.
Good to see Gaz resplendent in purple Oakley Jawbreakers
Not purple...black and orange but with Prizm Trail lenses
I crashed hard on the practice lap yesterday (front brake issue after mistakingly using bike spray rather than brake cleaner for a split second). Hit the tree on the A line descent hard enough to snap by front brake lever clean off...
Anyway, I still made the start line and was having possibly my best race of the season, well inside the top 10 until the Elite leader came past and I thought I was on my last lap. I pushed hard thinking I was done only to be told I still had 1 to go...it broke me and I was almost a minute slower on the last lap with some horrible cramp on the two biggest climbs (I also missed a gel and 2 bottles too so that didnt help).
Lost 3 places on that 6th lap to finish 12th
At the start of the year I decided to try and do a race every month. I thought I'd be improving by the end of the year, but it seems to have gone down hill a bit, or I've lost my way or something. It started with the Brighton Big Dog in August, I only managed just under four hours solo before bailing out. In September, I managed to get online entry to the Langdon Hills race mentioned above with only 5 minutes before entry closed. Didn't prepare everything until the morning which meant I didn't have enough time to get through the delays through Dartford Tunnel, so missed that one. Entered online for the 1st Gorrick Autumn series race today, but again, didn't really prepare much (other than putting forks back from service back on bike). Spent most of yesterday evening obsessing over some bit of computer code/script meant I didn't start looking at how to get there until about 1:30am. Went to bed at 1:45am, but partner's heavy breathing, too much bedding, and active brain ensured sleep wasn't going to happen until it was too late. Didn't fancy a 220 mile round trip with 1.5 hour race on 3 hours sleep so another £24 down the drain due to piss poor preperation 🙁
Just curious how Langdon Hills compare with Hadleigh? Haven't raced at either, but have ridden Hadleigh a couple of times (and quite like it).
[url= https://c5.staticflickr.com/6/5508/30203016516_03390c61de_b.jp g" target="_blank">https://c5.staticflickr.com/6/5508/30203016516_03390c61de_b.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/N1Wmy5 ]Banjo Rampage[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/68424083@N07/ ][/url], on Flickr
My XC training plan (rest, ride a bit of XC and do the odd interval) has paid off though I should perhaps say that only one rider didn't podium in my class.
Got to be in it to win it - well done!
Just curious how Langdon Hills compare with Hadleigh? Haven't raced at either, but have ridden Hadleigh a couple of times (and quite like it).
Well Langdon is natural rooty single track & double track. It felt just as hard to me, but then I'm not a powerful rider, and you need to be to do well in both those.