Events Events Events!

Well, there's been 3 consecutive competitions since i lasted wrote, but I've barely been home to sit down and blog!

IXS Dirtmasters in Germany:

Well i flew out to Cologne late last month to travel over to Winterberg in the German mountains for the second annual Dirtmasters competition, which has Dh, 4x and slopestyle comps over the weekend, i competed in the latter two. Rolling up to a pretty large slopestyle course with some pretty big features was something I've never done before and what made matters worse was the fact that i was the only english guy riding! Meaning i had no one to talk to, so i dug out my ipod and befriended the old thing and put on pendulum all weekend! I was riding in the pro class and i was nervous as i hadn't ridden my dirt jump bike in about a month so it all felt a little odd and twitchy to begin with but i soon got back into my flow for qualifying. Saturday was the busiest day as i had qualifying and finals for slopestyle and qualifying for 4x all in one day! first was the 4x! which i managed to get 18th in! ran down to get changed and straight onto the slopestyle course, putting in a solid run of tables, 360's and backflips and a no hander. Thinking i hadn't qualified i went to look at the sheets and i was 11th! with the top 20 going into the finals! doh! I put 2 solid runs together and came 15th overall. Sunday saw the 4x action and i was eager to get on the very bmx inspired track to get some gates and practice in. In my first heat i managed a close 2nd behind a european rider and then in my second heat i had the rider i came second to and the german national champ, a bad gate, and being pinched off in the first straight saw me into 3rd place and knocked out, putting me 25th overall. Not a bad weekend!

World Cup Round 2 - Andorra:

The long boring drive through France seemed to take longer than usual and i got very bored, arriving early afternoon on the wednesday we had enough time to walk the crazily steep 4x course and also the dh track. The 4x track was one of the craziest i had ever seen, with big jumps, and a very loose/damp surface. I rode qualifying well and pulled out a pretty good time putting me 44th, 3rd gate pick, great! But i had made top 64 so i wasn't too worried! Racing saw me pitched against 2 well performing riders, Joost Wichman and Matt Simmonds. I got a good gate and stayed in 2nd behind Joost all the way down th first straight, down the step downs, over the quad and logs, into the big jumps, which i hadn't jumped until race day purely because they looked so sketchy and soft and the crashes i saw in practice put me off until i really had to do them! The first require slight braking, the 2nd then required a grab of the brakes to then pedal your arse off for the last huge double, unluckily for me i managed to slightly over clear the second one, so i pulled off to the side and ride through the soft stuff ahead of matt, he managed a smoother line than me and pedalled past into the second last corner, leaving me in 3rd and knocked out! checking back later i had got 39th overall, so i had improved on my result from Maribor!

World Cup Round 3 - Fort William:

I hitched a lift with my downhill sponsors, Mtb-bitz to fort william to help them set up and man their shop in between riding. We arrived late wednesday night for registration on thursday for the 4x. The same day saw qualifying, the midgies were out and the track was very loose and rocky, i didn't really expect anything else from Fort William. Due to a lack of starts the 4x qualifying cut straight to 32 riders. Something i was very worried about because i hadn't managed a top 30 result yet this year. By some divine miracle i pulled out a good qualifying result, 25th! i was so happy to have made the cut and be in there when so many didn't make it. I also did a helmet cam of the 4x track for Dirt magazines website, which was fun, especially as i had forgotten what billy had said to make it work at the bottom, and i was just fiddling with it until it beeped! luckily it worked and thats now online! So then, onto racing, I caught a glimpse of the moto sheets and i was immediately silenced, as i had Cedric Gracia, Scott Beaumont, and Mikey Haderer (an american i had made friends with at maribor) in my first heat. It wasn't an easy race, and i pushed hard to keep up with them all to the bottom, after the large tabletop i took the corner flat out and I'm not sure what happened but i ended up on the floor in a heap and a sore leg, so i picked up myself and my bike and rolled down to the finish line, scraping together some points. Somehow i still managed 28th overall for the race which i am very pleased with as i have improved on every world cup race result so far.

This week sees the 3rd round of the NPS4x, returning to Chicksands, so a local race for me, which is a good thing!

Pat