After the last few races being quite relaxed at the start I decided it was time to push the pace right from the start and see who had the legs to hold on. So race start was fast and frantic and I sat in behind Anton for a few metres then nailed it to lead onto the single track shoot. Straight away I cranked it into top gear and Anton and I already had a good gap once back onto the open gravel road!
The race was three laps, 10km each lap with 350m climbing gain. After a super quick first lap we had a substantial lead over the others and I lead us into the pit area/feed zone. Toward the end of the second lap Anton made a strong attack up a climb and despite seeing it coming my legs just weren't quite there to respond!
Although Anton slipped slowly away I consolidated my position to come in a strong second overall. I was pretty pleased how I handled this one with nearly 5 minutes back to 3rd place.
My Trek 29er was running mint, smooth as anything along the Hanmer trails and ideally suited to these tracks. After last weekend I would be fair to say my setup was a bit more suited to this race than last weekend!
My Geax Barro Race tyres were excellent even though there were some damp/wet parts of the tracks to contend with. They really are a super fast, fantastic free rolling XC race tyre!
Sunday, December 11, 2011
Frog Rock Race
The Frog Rock Race was another beauty of a race for climbing. Amongst the hills of Waipara, the course was 26km but while short it had 1000m of vertical climbing.
From race start the course shot up a steep hill and I had quickly realised my bike was setup incorrectly for the climbing as I was already in my lowest gear grinding away! I still easily held on but knew she would be a tough day if this kept up. Not long after the first climb the course hadn't been marked properly and the leading group of riders, including me, found ourselves agreeing to jump a gate in the hope we were still on the right track! Once we came to another gate we figured we were still off track so after a nice wee climb back up the hill we found a farm track that took us back on the right path. From here we were riding with the rest of the field making our way through everyone.
Once we had some clear track I was riding with Craig Oliver following me, grinding away up the majority of the climbs being badly over geared. On one of the fast downhills at roughly the 19km mark I heard an air chilling scream from behind and while the temptation was there to gap it and eat into Anton's lead, I decided to do the right thing and go back and check Craig hadn't seriously injured himself.
With Craig back on his bike, I rode the remainder of the race with him and came down the final downhill leading. I was now spinning like crazy towards the finish, tapped out to the max with my gearing. I was not expecting the sprint to be contested but sure enough it was and I made sure I took the next winning place 2nd overall.
From race start the course shot up a steep hill and I had quickly realised my bike was setup incorrectly for the climbing as I was already in my lowest gear grinding away! I still easily held on but knew she would be a tough day if this kept up. Not long after the first climb the course hadn't been marked properly and the leading group of riders, including me, found ourselves agreeing to jump a gate in the hope we were still on the right track! Once we came to another gate we figured we were still off track so after a nice wee climb back up the hill we found a farm track that took us back on the right path. From here we were riding with the rest of the field making our way through everyone.
Once we had some clear track I was riding with Craig Oliver following me, grinding away up the majority of the climbs being badly over geared. On one of the fast downhills at roughly the 19km mark I heard an air chilling scream from behind and while the temptation was there to gap it and eat into Anton's lead, I decided to do the right thing and go back and check Craig hadn't seriously injured himself.
With Craig back on his bike, I rode the remainder of the race with him and came down the final downhill leading. I was now spinning like crazy towards the finish, tapped out to the max with my gearing. I was not expecting the sprint to be contested but sure enough it was and I made sure I took the next winning place 2nd overall.
Spring Crusher
The Spring Crusher MTB race was certainly a good race to have a crack at. With 36km across all of the Hanmer tracks and trails along with 1000m of vertical climbing gains it made for a solid on the body. From the start I was where I needed to be and not long after the first hill the race split up with three of us leading the charge. Conditions were wet and as we came onto the first long single trail downhill my tyre choice wasn't on the money. I struggled to ride smoothly and cleanly slowly slipping away from the other two. Not that this mattered too much as I could still see them up the next few climbs that made there way throughout the forest roads. Each corner I knew I was gaining easily back onto them and thought this was great as I didn't have to put myself in the 'box' to get back on. But when I was about 20metres behind the inevitable happened. The course came around a corner and levelled out, I managed to follow some old course markers which made there way down the hill and up the valley, completely off track! Once I realised this I knew any chance of winning was well in truly over as I had already lost roughly 10 minutes so I followed my tracks back and found where I was supposed to go! I was pretty disappointed but it was still a good training ride around the Hanmer trail network!
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