The first round of the BMBS was preceded by R3 of the Gorrick Spring
Series and the Black Park XC races. Both of these races were on flat,
twisty courses and so were great preparation for Sherwood Pines. At
the Gorrick, the field was impressive - around 25 riders - with many
strong riders in attendance. I ended up 7th or 8th, I can't remember!
I got a bit isolated off the start as I slipped on a piece of
singletrack, such is the nature of the course at Crowthorne simple
mistakes like this get ruthlessly punished. At Black Park, the field
was even stronger - with Jody Crawforth, Scott Forbes and Luke Smith
all racing the event as a BMBS warm up. It is great to see the West
Drayton MBC event growing every year. This year's course was dry and
fast, with some very tight sections between the trees! With not even
a hint of gradient, it was a 2hr flat out blast. This race really
took it out of me - I tried to do some efforts the following week and
was really suffering. I decided to just ride easy for the week and a
half before BMBS R1 and try to recover and trust that my winter
training had been worth it.
My strategy at Sherwood was to hold back from the pack at the start -
I was gridded on the back row and was dead last (50th or so) going out
of the arena. My decision paid off, as one rider took a big fall
going up the first fire road. I chose this opportunity to sprint
round the outside of a number of riders and made up a lot of places.
the first singletrack section was a pile-up, with riders barging pats
one another to gain an advantage. In retrospect, I was perhaps rather
too polite here and lost a few of the places I'd just gained. I also
lost sight of Phil (Lenney)....
It took me 4 1/2 out of the 6 laps to catch Phil again - having passed
a lot of riders I'd expected to lose to in the process. I felt ok -
the legs were still fairly tired from the previous races. Catching
Phil gave me the added drive to keep going - the last lap was a game
of cat and mouse between the two of us as we continued our battle from
last season. Phil slipped out as we turned onto the final fire road
and I took full advantage, accelerating past him and sprinting the
last 1/2 mile to the line to claim 25th place by a few seconds in a
replay of the 2009 Expert finish.
I couldn't quite beleive that, after 5 months training and the
occasional ride together, Phil and I are still the inseparable couple
of MTB racing. If all the races are this close between us, we have a
great season to look forward to!
I'm sure Phil will be along in a minute with a report of his race - he
rode a very strong race pretty much on his own to get 4th place -
unfortunately the riders in 2nd and 3rd rode together and pm a cousre
like Sherwood this makes catching them very hard indeed.
George
