The National Champs is the pinnacle of events on the New Zealand calender and to accommodate 2011 Dunedin hosted this high priority event. Conditions this year brought a lot of heartache for myself with tyres as the course's mid-section was an absolute mud bath and with no mud-tyres in stock for the 29'er prior to heading down south I was forced to use my standard set-up. Each of my two practice days the course became worse each time and race day was going to be full on just as any good race should be!
After waking up and heading to the venue it was a cold day and after watching the morning race it was time to get some warm gear on get a good solid warm up done. Just like any race the final hour before it starts fly by and before I knew it I was called up to the front row - a good staring position. I had a great start holding third postion through the start loop and gapped it up the major climb with Dirk Peters and Carl Jones. This then took us down a quick downhill then up the muddy mid-section of track which I was dreading. Once at the top the fun started...NOT!!! After watching Carl and Dirk ride away as they had appropriate tyres on and as I dropped behind, Mike Northcott caught me up by the bottom of the hill. We stayed together and I pushed it on the second lap but once again on that mid-section of track no traction meant no fast momentum! I lost another place coming down getting passed by Mark Leishman and my final couple of laps I ended up running this gnarly downhill. Knowing I couldn't do anything about the situation I was absolutely gutted after my fantastic start but all in all finishing 5th Elite and 2nd Under23 was not a bad result. However when you know you could have done better and it is out of your control it is always a tough feeling!
Next big race will be Oceania Champs in Australia - look forward to getting on the International scene again!
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