Needless to say I’m not particularly ‘match fit’ at the moment as this is only my second race of the year, and having ridden at Combe sydenham last year, I was certainly looking forward to the challenge of a 3hr race round a proper enduro course to test me. Astonishingly I wasn’t gigging last night so I actually had a decent nights kip! That helped I can tell you!
With the weather we had all week memories of last year came flooding back (see earlier blog) and I thought, oh no, here we go again! But as I arrived the sun was shining and that turned out to be the case all day. Yippee, summers on it’s way.
Done all the necessary, had a chat with a few people, then it was off up the hill and on to the start line. A big class too was entered in the clubman 2st, so I knew that a good start would be handy. The flag dropped and I must admit it wasn’t one of my best getaways. As we entered the woods for the first time things got a bit tight between riders and I had a little off because I simply ran out of space with nowhere to go, and by the time I got up and kicked her back into life, I was near the back.
The first real test came soon after in the shape of a slippery, uphill section about 200 meters long, not a steep one, but it caught a few of us out riding up it for the first time so I was glad to make up to the top of that.
The woods I thought were excellent, everything you could want for a decent days racing, Some nice slimly downhill’s, tricky slippery uphill’s, off cambers, tree roots, a few fire roads, a couple of jumps and a nice water crossing thrown in for good measure. All in all, about 7-8 miles in total. To be honest, you had to be ‘on the ball’ for most of the lap because there wasn’t much in the way of easy bits where you could take a breather.
I did feel a bit ’rusty’ for the first couple of laps, but that soon passed and I really began to enjoy things and started to relax a bit more.
I pitted after 1hr and 40 ins and was now thinking about get as many laps in as I could before the 3hrs were up. I then had a ‘why the hell did I do that for’ moment! I must have been traveling all of about 5mph going through a narrow one track hillside ledge when I stupidly over balanced and went tumbling down the hill. The bike stayed up the top and I rolled over 6 or 7 times stopping halfway down the hill. As I got up (annoyed but laughing with myself for such a silly mistake) the rider behind me shouted down to me ‘hey, nice one mate’ all in good humor of course, definitely one of those you’ve been framed moments that one! As I clambered back up to the top I was then struggling to pick the bike up on the off camber as it was laying on it’s side downhill, but luckily for me the young lad Richard Tucker came round the corner and stopped to give us a hand to get the bike back upright and back off I went, no damage done. (By the way, look out for Richard in the future as he is riding well and has had some excellent results lately and he’s only 17!)
As I went through the transponders with about 25 mins to go I knew if I pushed hard I get another 2 laps in but that’s where it all went a bit ‘Pete tong’. I was doing well and on target until I came to one of the slippery narrow steep little climbs in the woods which I conveniently managed to get stuck on halfway up. Sods law that, I’d been riding up it every lap with no problem and just when you want to put a faster lap in something like that happens. I had to wait for the traffic to clear before I could go back down and have another go which I did, and guess what? I done exactly the bloody same thing again! Yet again I had to wait for the traffic to clear before I could safely go back down and try again. 3rd time lucky so they say, and this time I managed to make up there, although I reckon I must have wasted a good 6-7 mins on that bloody hill. I was in a nutshell a bit ’p*ssed off with myself’ with that, and I as I looked down at my watch I knew I wouldn’t get another lap in and that’s exactly how it turned out to be as I finished about 5 mins over the 3hrs.
All in all an excellent event and was well pleased with the 7 laps I did which was a big improvement on last year, and to cap it all off, I actually drove home for once with the sun shining. Happy days!
Finishing position: 29/40 (clubman 2st)
Bike status: new front wheel bearings
Injuries: none
