Quebec championships

This weekend I raced at Mont Sainte Anne which is 3 hours north of Bromont. We drove up on thursday and rode a few laps of the track that evening.

This race was the Quebec Championships (regionals) and includes the majority of the world champs track, there were a few differances like the worlds track climbs a bit longer half way through the lap and there are extra technical sections of single track that will in the worlds track. The track is super fun, with technical sections to keep us on our toes and some nice step climbs along with a few rolling bridges to keep the crowd interested.

My race was just like the rest of my races in Canada, we started at the back and had to make our wy through the feild which is good pratice for the world cup this coming weekend. I am also laking race form, I just kept picking off riders until about the 4 lap and then the riders started being a bit more competitive with me like racing for the single track and battling it out on the climbs. I felt strong in my last lap. I finished 13th and about 9 minutes down.

Bromont Open

This weekends race was slightly depressing with finishing nineteen minutes down and in 27^th place in elite. I have been feeling really weird on the bike, kind of sluggish and dead legs even in training.

The race track for this weekends race was a good one, it was based on a ski field it had about a four minute climb to the top and then traversed back down with plenty of technical obstacles including rocks and roots. Riding these technical sections were fine in training but when at race pace, if I wasn’t concentrating 100% I would get a bit rowdy and end up losing time. I was happy with the track it was a great race track, had good climbing some fast single track and a lot of technical features.

So there I was, on the start line in the beaming sun and glanced over to a temperature display screen at the base of a chair lift and it was reading 29 degrees. With a Midday start it was only going to get hotter and hotter. I was called up 11^th because of my UCI points from the NZ season so I was all ready for a good start.

The gun goes off and I clipped straight into my pedal and got on with the race. I was right up there mixing it with the big boys, but slowly everyone started coming around me and I just felt average, really gutting! I was trying to hold the wheels but I was just not strong enough.

Lap one I lost a lot of places and I was racing with a few other guys so we were all still pushinghard to get to the single track first. This went on for awhile and I slowly got in front of them and caught a few other guys. We ended up doing short 6 laps.

All and all I’m not racing as well as I would of liked to here in Canada and have missed out on the chance to make the worlds team and will now be concentrating on the world cup in Windham as my main event to finish off my Canadian season of racing.

The time I have been in Bromont I have been staying with Mike, Michelle, Adrian, Locky, Andrew a Canadian guy that we have meet and Sebastian, Sebastian has let us take over his house for the week which has been so nice of him thanks heaps man.

Ontario Cup/Selection

This last weeks of training went well, I was feeling good and ready to race. After many laps on the track to get to know all the hotlines etc. the track was starting to feel natural to me. On tuesday night we done a club race which was three laps and gave me a good chance to get the feel of the track at race pace.

The race track was interesting, it started with a climb for about 3 minutes and then into flat single track with a few short decents and flat roads which made it a track with very little recovery time.There were some nice technical sections that took a bit of time to work out the fastest way through them, which was fun to do with a few mates just to get other opinons.

The race morning was full of nerves and we had a 1:30pm start so all morning we were just sitting around the campsite killing time and thinking about the race. By the time came around to go up to the track I was ready and amping for a good race. I had a alright warm up but didnt feel the best, i felt a bit slugish and I done some sprints to try and fire myself up and then went into the starting gates.

The start was pretty fast thanks to another kiwi Mikey Northcott who ripped off the front up the main climb, I got caught in a bit of a tangle up about 100 meters from the start but it didnt seem to effect me that much as I just passed alot of people on the climb before hitting the single track.

The first half of the race my legs were feeling slugish but I just kept on pushing and hoped to push through, sure enough in the fourth lap out of five I started feeling better and took my carbo shot and for my last lap i felt great which was anoying cuz I wish I felt like that for my whole race but that was just how it was.

Over all I wasnt that happy with my result which was 10th in elite and I was 6 minutes down on the winner Adam Morka.

The New Zeland team has been named as you all maybe aware I havnt made the team but have been giving the chance to prove that I can get a top thirty at the world Champs at my next race which is a UCI event and there should be some fast guys to compare myself against. Either way if I get a good enough result at Bromont this weekend and make the worlds team well in good, how ever if I am not fast enough I will still keep training just as hard and make my peak for the world cup in Windham near New york.

I am now in Bromont staying with Mikey, Locky, Michelle and Adrian and Sebastien (its his house).