Rd 2 British Downhill - Moelfre Round Up

Well folks, the dust has settled from a great weekends racing at Moelfre which admittedly isnt my favourite track on the circuit, however the weekend was blessed with amazing sunshine but the dreaded Moelfre crosswinds struck during saturdays practice and unfortunately took their fair share of casualties (at least 3 air ambulance trips in total)

SPS Team Pit Area

On the friday evening most of the SPS team got together, walked the track and then chilled under the awning with Team Manager Tristan turning up the bass as we listened to Radio 1's 20 year celebration for Pete Tong which was pretty cool.

Saturday practice went well apart from the fact that there wasnt enough foam for the uplift to protect the bikes and pretty much everyone I spoke too had scratched their bikes unnessarily, Note to the BDS organisers this is surely basic essentials, the damage is now done but come on guys lets sort it out to prevent this kinda damage happening again at future rounds. Round 1 at Nant G was fine so how come this happened here!


Having fun in practice


The track was pretty much the same as last year turn for turn so everyone soon got the hang of it and the sun also made for a proper good atmosphere both down in the pit area and up on the hill. The SPS Santa Cruz V10's were eating up the braking bumps with ease.

Sunday morning I just did one clean pactice run, my qualifying run was quite early on so I wanted to take some time to check my bike over and get rested up ready for action. SPS team mate Tom Kelly had brought his turbo along so I made sure I had a good warm up on there to raise my heartrate before heading up for qualifying, ending up in 3rd place..

I was sorry to hear the news that the man mountain and possibly the nicest rival on track big Dave List had taken a tumble on his first run and had been chauffered to hospital with a broken collarbone, genuinely I wish him a speedy recovery and just hope they didnt have to cut his brand new race kit off... Get well soon Listy.

Race runs soon came around and it was great to have my family turn up to support me, it was a real job to stay hydrated with the sun beating down and it made a change from the last weekends wet and muddy Hopton.

Racing went pretty good although I rode the top section with a bit of caution, anyway I came over the finish line and in to the hot seat with only two riders left on the hill, both of which went faster leaving me with 3rd place overall behind Hughes and Page, pretty stoked with that for both me and the SPS point of view.

The rest of the crew all did well with most riders really improving and heading towards their own personal goals. I'm under no doubt that the help, support and information that the SPS provides us all and the time that Steve, Tristan, Ratboy, Andy Kyffin and Ricky Bobby put in/volunteer is totally invaluble so huge thanks guys, just wish I'd had this insight 10+ years ago!

Noteable mentions to Nathan who took 2nd in the Experts and Jenny who romped home in the senior womens to also take a podium. The junior category is mentally close this year and arguably the most competitive category, watch your backs front runners because the SPS boys are a coming. Oh and not forgetting the Boss who finished a close 2nd behind Gee Atherton and I hear Steve also took a nice new Tag watch home for his awesome speed trap effort, big props.

Catch you soon

Pearce Cycles DH Rd 1 - Hopton

This past weekend was the first round of the midlands regional DH's ran by the excellent Pearce Cycles crew which are always ran super slick and have a loyal band of racers attending.

During the week i'd been training hard with http://www.adywatts.co.uk/ who's really helping me out with my training this season, he's got an awesome studio with everything you need and nothing you dont, simple, he also really knows his stuff. With the lighter evenings i'd also managed to get out for a mid week XC ride which was a bonus.

The van was loaded up with the new steed and was Hopton bound early on saturday morning. On arrival I bumped in to a fair few local riders from Hereford who were all super keen to kick start their season off with good results. I signed on and decided to walk the course.

The top section was the same as we'd practiced a few weeks before when the SPS crew had their training camp here so I was already feeling pretty confident on my lines after being shown the way by the likes of Steve, Bryceland and Marc B so things were looking good. The bottom section cut onto an older course that I can remember riding bits of probably 10 years ago but over time it's been refined for the better and on the whole made for an awesome race track.

It was cool to bump in to a load of the SPS crew (Tom, Ben, Loosedog, Jen, Freddie and Michael) and all catch up and help each other out through the course of the weekend. Everyones pumped with the new bikes and kit and all getting to grips with the set up.

Saturday turned out to be a real beauty of a days riding, the sun was out, the track dried out loads a.m and was deep in dust by close of play. There were plenty of lines to be had if you took the time to seek them out or hung around to watch the fast boys through... The dry conditions gave me a chance to give the bike a shake down and get the suspension dialled right in, I'm still refining the set up at the moment each time I ride and it was cool to run a few things past friend and proprieter of http://www.j-techsuspension.co.uk/ Jimmer, who told me a few trade secrets, cheers lad, her goes up and down now very well indeed!

Hopton's just down the road from me so it was a luxury to travel home saturday evening, see my family and get a good nights kip.

Open Section

Sunday morning, first thing I did was take that nervous peak out the curtains, the kind you really wanna look but also you dont, in case it's wet... Well, it was gorgeous and sunny at home...! 30 miles north at Hopton was a different story though, the Shropshire hills were hugging the cloud tight bringing with them plenty of heavy showers and transforming the track in to something resembling the somme in places.

It was raining steadily for the first race run and the track was still pretty grippy on High Rollers, there was lots of last minute tyre changes going on in the pits but I stuck to my guns and went with the dry's.. Onboard the new V10 i'd been growing with confidence all day saturday and knew if I held it together and hit my lines i'd be capable of posting a good time. I managed to catch the guy infront for the last 150m or so which made me ease off a bit and distracted me from my lines a little but I came over the finish line and in to the lead with the fastest time of the day so far. I was so stoked but knew some of the fast boys were still on the hill. Luckily my time was good enough to hold on to first place after the first run which meant I was last man down the hill for the second race run. It was cool that my family had come along to watch and I definitely got a buzz out of them being there to support me even if the dogs did have one hell of a fight, all bets are off, the terrier won... paws down!

More showers came and went throughout the afternoon. I headed up the track and watched the Expert and Elite riders come down and witnessed SPS team mate Tom Kelly go down pretty hard on the final section, gutted, he looked right on the pace until then as well.

Second race runs came around with the majority of people going a touch slower than their first, i stuck with dry tyres which was a mistake and paid the price with a very average run, at one point I pulled a tear off from my goggles and pulled them half off my face so had to re-adjust and also got stuck behind the tree on THAT right hander before the fireroad right infront of Marc Beaumont who was watching and was well impressed, all amatuer stuff..... Luckily for me the time from my first run still stood and I took my first overall win for the Steve Peat Syndicate, mega pumped.

Check out full results here http://www.rootsandrain.co.uk/race295/2011-apr-3-pearce-cycles-1-hopton/

Right.... off to wash all my muddy kit