Hey Guys
Well Saturday was the end of the National XC Series. We Arrived at the track on Friday Morning and went straight on to check out the course. The course had changed a lot from the previous year. It was super tight in sections and the single track was really technical. It was a flat out powering course, with only one or two nasty short little climbs.
After practise we went straight to the accommodation and chilled. Back at accommodation I tried to stay as chilled as possible to get to the race well rested on Saturday Morning.
After a really good nights rest I felt good for the days race and slowly got ready for the race. With my race only being at 13:15 i took my time in getting ready. We pulled into the Fountains Nature reserve at around 11. We unpacked the car, set up our feeding zone and then began to get ready. The nerves really kicked in, as the reality of how much was riding on the race hit me.
I went for a warm up with 30min to go before the start, and started ride the course through my head. With 15min to go we got called onto the start shoot, luckily having had a good season I was called up 2nd and had the perfect line on the start.
As the whistle went,the pace was hot. It was a mad dash down to the first corner before hitting the single track. Arno (series Leader) was in the lead with myself sitting on his wheel. I sat his wheel through out the course. Luke Roberts made contact with us, and it soon became a major three way battle. The positions chopped and changed through the course of the 2nd and 3rd lap,however, as we caught a much slower rider, Arno managed to sneak past the rider, causing him to unclip and stop in front of us. This gave him a considerable lead and Luke and I were forced to chase down hard. We slowly began to eat away at the lead, but we were again slowed down by a slower rider that would not move. Arno jumped at the opportunity and really pushed the pace opening up a really big gap on us.
Going into lap 4 Luke opened up a gap of two or so bike lengths on me in the one single track, feeling very anxious I felt forced to push to close the gap. This proved to be costly, and caused a small slit in my tyre. I tried riding as much as I could, to try avoid stopping, but by the time I reached the first technical climb, my tyre was flat. I bombed it and pushed hard to close down the gap. But with only one lap left to go I had to settle for 3rd overall.
Unfortunately, the 3rd position didn't allow me to wrap up the championship, but I still managed to take 2nd overall for the season. Congrats to Luke who managed to get 3rd overall in the season. Arno rode an exceptional series this year, winning 4 out of the 5 races and placing 3rd at Cascades.
All that's left to do now is African-Continental Champs later on this year at Mankele in Nelspruit. This weekend is the Super Classic in mTunzini, we'll see how that one goes.
Until Then
Ciao
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Friday, May 22, 2009
Breakfast at Villiers
Hey guys!
Just a quick update, we left for Pretoria for the last round of the National MTB series this morning. Boy is it freezing in this part of the world, it was only 3 degrees when we climbed out the car here in Villiers. We're sitting at the Wimpy for a quick breakfast before the final leg of the trip.
I'll keep you guys up to date with what the course is like.
Ciao
B
Just a quick update, we left for Pretoria for the last round of the National MTB series this morning. Boy is it freezing in this part of the world, it was only 3 degrees when we climbed out the car here in Villiers. We're sitting at the Wimpy for a quick breakfast before the final leg of the trip.
I'll keep you guys up to date with what the course is like.
Ciao
B
Monday, May 11, 2009
Karkloof MTB Festival- 2009
Well this years Karkloof festival has come and gone, with some pleasing results for Team Jeep SA. I sat out the night relay and the XC on Saturday, as I had already won the KZN Championship, and thought it'd be a good idea to try and save my legs.
Then came the u16 Red Sprint Shoot out on Saturday afternoon. The course was set over a very short grass track on the polo fields, and was littered with different obstacles. The qualifying went off pretty well, and I was tied for first after a decent run. Then came the final. The start was really hot from the word go with Jac-Johan Steyn leading it up front, but unfortunately, nearing the end of lap #1 0f 6, Jac made a crucial mistake and bought a big piece of some Karkloof Property.
I jumped on the anchors really hard to avoid the accident and this gave Arno du Toit a really good opportunity to pass on the right and take the early lead. He Managed to open a couple of bike lengths on me, and I was forced to chase him down. Eventually after two laps of brutal sprinting I latched onto him, and managed to catch him off guard going into one corner on lap 4. On lap 5 I decided to really push, and managed to open a very slight gap. I came onto the last bridge really hard and made a bad mistake, jumping to the bottom and nearly crashing in the process, this really scrubbed off all my speed and I was even more surprised to find out that they had made the race 5 laps and it was now a print to the finish. I got my speed up as quick as possible, and Arno and I crossed the line together, a photo finish with the chief commasaire deciding the final result as it was such a close call. The win went to Arno and I was placed second. With that result in the bag, we headed for home , to return the next morning for the 40km race.
We arrived real early at the polo fields on Sunday morning for the main events of the weekend, the Karkloof Classic 75km and 45km. The temp was only 4 degrees and I really felt sorry for the marathon riders leaving at 8:00am!
At around 8:45 we were eventually let onto our start after what seemed like a really long wait. The start this year seemed way slower than the years before, with all the top junior and youth riders being there, as we were just waiting to see who'd brake the ice. As soon as we hit the district road, Adriaan Louw (DCM Chrome) attacked and the bunch split up really quickly, with about eight of us in total giving chase.
The bunch reduced to about seven of us as we climbed the first climb on Renee Stubbs' farm and to tell the truth my legs were feeling the hurt after the sprint shoot out the previous afternoon. But I hung in and at the top of the long, sluggishly slow climb I came to the front and pushed hard in an effort to try split the teams that were with us. The pace was heating up all the time and the attacks showed no signs of stopping.
Luke Roberts (maverick) and I needed to separate the teams before they really began to work with each other to drop the us. Luke rode the climbs really hard but the guys kept clawing their way onto the back of him.
On the really rough technical stuff, I would manage to brake up the line of riders but the teams would work together and catch back up on the open sections again and the pace remained relentless the entire time.
Unfortunately Luke dropped off just after Half way, and I was left to fend for myself against the two teams of DCM Chrome and Mr Price Scott, each consisting of 2 very capable riders. I countered every surge and attack that came, but as I would catch one rider, the others would attack from behind. As we hit the King of the Mountain (KOM) I dropped off from the bunch. I rode comfortably at a pretty fast pace, just to try find my legs and hopefully claw my way back into the bunch again at a later stage. Luckily there was a really long single track after the KOM and I slowly closed the guys down. With 5km to go I was totally border line outta control through the single track. This section rade so well and I let it all hang out but 2km or so to go,I was caught behind back markers from the 20km going through a mud puddle. Adriaan(DCM) and Arno(Mr Price Scott) opened up a gap of about 40sec gap on me at this stage.
When I got the chance I got passed the slower riders and I pushed myself to the absolute braking point and managed to finish in 5th place just under 20 seconds behind Arno. Travis Walker (DCM Chrome)claimed the honours on the day ahead of James Reid (Mr Price Scott) with Adriaan, Arno and I rounding up the top 5.
The race was absolutely brutal from start to finish, and the pace was blistering. The racing was also really tight, and the high quality of racing was certainly seen by all.
Congrats to Andrew Nicholson and his team for putting such an awesome event together and a special thanks to Rene Stubbs,Bruce Mackenzie, Blake Makenzie, Guy Solomon and Sappi for allowing us to ride on there farms.
Then came the u16 Red Sprint Shoot out on Saturday afternoon. The course was set over a very short grass track on the polo fields, and was littered with different obstacles. The qualifying went off pretty well, and I was tied for first after a decent run. Then came the final. The start was really hot from the word go with Jac-Johan Steyn leading it up front, but unfortunately, nearing the end of lap #1 0f 6, Jac made a crucial mistake and bought a big piece of some Karkloof Property.
I jumped on the anchors really hard to avoid the accident and this gave Arno du Toit a really good opportunity to pass on the right and take the early lead. He Managed to open a couple of bike lengths on me, and I was forced to chase him down. Eventually after two laps of brutal sprinting I latched onto him, and managed to catch him off guard going into one corner on lap 4. On lap 5 I decided to really push, and managed to open a very slight gap. I came onto the last bridge really hard and made a bad mistake, jumping to the bottom and nearly crashing in the process, this really scrubbed off all my speed and I was even more surprised to find out that they had made the race 5 laps and it was now a print to the finish. I got my speed up as quick as possible, and Arno and I crossed the line together, a photo finish with the chief commasaire deciding the final result as it was such a close call. The win went to Arno and I was placed second. With that result in the bag, we headed for home , to return the next morning for the 40km race.
We arrived real early at the polo fields on Sunday morning for the main events of the weekend, the Karkloof Classic 75km and 45km. The temp was only 4 degrees and I really felt sorry for the marathon riders leaving at 8:00am!
At around 8:45 we were eventually let onto our start after what seemed like a really long wait. The start this year seemed way slower than the years before, with all the top junior and youth riders being there, as we were just waiting to see who'd brake the ice. As soon as we hit the district road, Adriaan Louw (DCM Chrome) attacked and the bunch split up really quickly, with about eight of us in total giving chase.
The bunch reduced to about seven of us as we climbed the first climb on Renee Stubbs' farm and to tell the truth my legs were feeling the hurt after the sprint shoot out the previous afternoon. But I hung in and at the top of the long, sluggishly slow climb I came to the front and pushed hard in an effort to try split the teams that were with us. The pace was heating up all the time and the attacks showed no signs of stopping.
Luke Roberts (maverick) and I needed to separate the teams before they really began to work with each other to drop the us. Luke rode the climbs really hard but the guys kept clawing their way onto the back of him.
On the really rough technical stuff, I would manage to brake up the line of riders but the teams would work together and catch back up on the open sections again and the pace remained relentless the entire time.
Unfortunately Luke dropped off just after Half way, and I was left to fend for myself against the two teams of DCM Chrome and Mr Price Scott, each consisting of 2 very capable riders. I countered every surge and attack that came, but as I would catch one rider, the others would attack from behind. As we hit the King of the Mountain (KOM) I dropped off from the bunch. I rode comfortably at a pretty fast pace, just to try find my legs and hopefully claw my way back into the bunch again at a later stage. Luckily there was a really long single track after the KOM and I slowly closed the guys down. With 5km to go I was totally border line outta control through the single track. This section rade so well and I let it all hang out but 2km or so to go,I was caught behind back markers from the 20km going through a mud puddle. Adriaan(DCM) and Arno(Mr Price Scott) opened up a gap of about 40sec gap on me at this stage.
When I got the chance I got passed the slower riders and I pushed myself to the absolute braking point and managed to finish in 5th place just under 20 seconds behind Arno. Travis Walker (DCM Chrome)claimed the honours on the day ahead of James Reid (Mr Price Scott) with Adriaan, Arno and I rounding up the top 5.
The race was absolutely brutal from start to finish, and the pace was blistering. The racing was also really tight, and the high quality of racing was certainly seen by all.
Congrats to Andrew Nicholson and his team for putting such an awesome event together and a special thanks to Rene Stubbs,Bruce Mackenzie, Blake Makenzie, Guy Solomon and Sappi for allowing us to ride on there farms.
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Maverick Super Classic - Cascades
Well today was the Maverick Super Classic, held at Cascades. I was pretty unsure of how the race would go today, as I did a pretty hard 4 hour ride yesterday down at the coast by doing the two gorges in the Lake Eland area down at Oribi Gorge to round off a week with some serious hours in the legs and as a result I was worried about having the legs to go the distance on the day.
Living about 1km from the venue I was able to sleep in, and only crawled out of bed at around 7am. At around 08:00 I took a chilled ride down to Cascades. I met up with good friend Trav Walker sporting his new colours of DCM Chrome, and we headed off for a good decent warm up before the 09:00 am start. There were one or two big names including Brandon Stewart and Craig Paul that were entered as well so I had to ensure the legs would be warm when the flag dropped.
At 9 sharp we were off and the pace was pretty quick and I tried to find a good rythm. But pretty soon Craig Paul ( Team Jeep)and Brandon Stewart came to the front and the pace really heated up. The bunch split up realy quickly and soon it was Craig, Brandon, Trav and I in the front.
Craig really pushed hard and it really made life on the bike hard as I had to dig deep to stay in touch. A couple of kilometers into the race I came to the front in one of the single tracks and pushed the pace as hard as I could to see if anyone in the group would drop off. Craig and Brandon stuck to me but we'd managed to get a small gap on Trav before the first major climb.
After the relatively short steep climb we'd opened up a bigger gap on Trav, but Brandon and Craig didn't let up the pace, it was relentless!!
The three of us hit the half way mark in 45 minutes flat and we were still all together, but pretty much as soon as we crested a steep sharp climb after the water point, Brandon launched his attack. At this point I was hurting and at first I had no legs to respond and neither did Craig, but it was a make or break situation and I decided to try push through the pain.
I slowly closed the gap and caught up to Brandon again after a really big effort. Brandon was now really on fire and I was struggling to stay with him and when we hit an open road, Brandon came into his own and just rode off the front. I gave chase and tried to catch up again but he was just far too strong.
I was hoping that Craig would come through again but had unfortunatly lost touch of us for a short while and then took a wrong turn and he got lost, so I was left to chase down Brandon by myself. We were now reaching the closing stages of the race and with Brandon having opened up just over a minute I had to crank it up a notch.
With 5km to go I hadn't closed the gap at all, but I kept pushing to open up the gap on 3rd as nI was unaware of who was behind me and how far behind they may be. I pushed down the technical single track and sprinted to the finish line, and crossed the line with just over a minute behind Brandon. I was super stoked with the result as I had improved my best result overall in a Super Classic to second place.
Congrats to Craig who worked his way back up to fourth position after taking his wrong turn. The organisers also deserve a shout out for an amazing coarse. It was a real mountain bikers event and despite not being the easiest race I thouroughly enjoyed every minute of it. Well done to all involved!
Results: Overall
1st- Brandon Stewart (DCM Chrome)
2nd- Brendon Davids (Team Jeep SA)
3rd- Travis Walker (DCM Chrome)
4th- Craig Paul (Team Jeep SA)
5th- David Louw
Living about 1km from the venue I was able to sleep in, and only crawled out of bed at around 7am. At around 08:00 I took a chilled ride down to Cascades. I met up with good friend Trav Walker sporting his new colours of DCM Chrome, and we headed off for a good decent warm up before the 09:00 am start. There were one or two big names including Brandon Stewart and Craig Paul that were entered as well so I had to ensure the legs would be warm when the flag dropped.
At 9 sharp we were off and the pace was pretty quick and I tried to find a good rythm. But pretty soon Craig Paul ( Team Jeep)and Brandon Stewart came to the front and the pace really heated up. The bunch split up realy quickly and soon it was Craig, Brandon, Trav and I in the front.
Craig really pushed hard and it really made life on the bike hard as I had to dig deep to stay in touch. A couple of kilometers into the race I came to the front in one of the single tracks and pushed the pace as hard as I could to see if anyone in the group would drop off. Craig and Brandon stuck to me but we'd managed to get a small gap on Trav before the first major climb.
After the relatively short steep climb we'd opened up a bigger gap on Trav, but Brandon and Craig didn't let up the pace, it was relentless!!
The three of us hit the half way mark in 45 minutes flat and we were still all together, but pretty much as soon as we crested a steep sharp climb after the water point, Brandon launched his attack. At this point I was hurting and at first I had no legs to respond and neither did Craig, but it was a make or break situation and I decided to try push through the pain.
I slowly closed the gap and caught up to Brandon again after a really big effort. Brandon was now really on fire and I was struggling to stay with him and when we hit an open road, Brandon came into his own and just rode off the front. I gave chase and tried to catch up again but he was just far too strong.
I was hoping that Craig would come through again but had unfortunatly lost touch of us for a short while and then took a wrong turn and he got lost, so I was left to chase down Brandon by myself. We were now reaching the closing stages of the race and with Brandon having opened up just over a minute I had to crank it up a notch.
With 5km to go I hadn't closed the gap at all, but I kept pushing to open up the gap on 3rd as nI was unaware of who was behind me and how far behind they may be. I pushed down the technical single track and sprinted to the finish line, and crossed the line with just over a minute behind Brandon. I was super stoked with the result as I had improved my best result overall in a Super Classic to second place.
Congrats to Craig who worked his way back up to fourth position after taking his wrong turn. The organisers also deserve a shout out for an amazing coarse. It was a real mountain bikers event and despite not being the easiest race I thouroughly enjoyed every minute of it. Well done to all involved!
Results: Overall
1st- Brandon Stewart (DCM Chrome)
2nd- Brendon Davids (Team Jeep SA)
3rd- Travis Walker (DCM Chrome)
4th- Craig Paul (Team Jeep SA)
5th- David Louw
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