Sunday was the first ever cross country race on the London 2012 Olympic games course. Lach, Dan and myself were the three lucky Aussie boy's to have the privilege to ride and race on the wild course. Bec ended up being the only female representative after Rowe had to head home due to sickness.
The course is 4.6km with 160m vertical climbing AKA tough. In a MAX effort I completed the lap in 12min34sec lap (faster than any of my race laps). The plan for us was to accumulate quality data from riding the course a lot. We punched out 6 laps on Friday, then 5 laps on Saturday and then in the test event we had 7 laps. So with a total of 18 laps with power taps and all sort of other recordings we hope to be able to really prepare for next years big race properly.
So the main focus of the week was to get time on the course and get everything sorted so when the time comes the one rider will be prepared.
The race had no UCI points and was a full test for the organisers, the athletes and everyone involved. That being said there was still a race run and won and here is how it went for me.....
On a perfect English day (blue sky, mid 20's) each rider was introduced to the crowd, including defending Olympic champion Julian Absolon. I was called up 19th and slotted in behind fellow team mate Dan McConnell. The start was a big concern for all involved and it was already established to be too dangerous for next year and was getting changed. It was too late for the test event and nerves were high.
I tried to follow Dan's wheel as we sprinted off the start line but I was chopped from both sides! I slipped back through the field and there were several close calls as riders jammed on their brakes and skidded into the bottle neck switch back climb. At one point I was on the ground! I looked back and saw only a handful of riders behind me. Out of the 50 starters I would have been in the last 15. I thought to myself 'don't panic, its a long race and you just need to ride into it'. Obviously I was panicking, scrambling for wheels etc.
Throughout the race I tried to get into a rhythm, the hotter conditions really took effect and I struggled to find my pace. In the third lap I started to come good, I took a gel and felt even better. It was turing out to be a pretty solid ride with a few riders eating my dust each lap it was really fun. I caught up to the current u23 world cup leader (I later found out he had a flat tire and was 3rd prior to the puncture), but I got onto his wheel and tried to lap around with him. I was happy to be on the EDICT because I could leave a gap then get back to him on the technical down hills and shoots. We kept catching people who were struggling in the hotter conditions and we formed a group of 12th to 18th which was really exciting.
With 1.5laps to go I attacked the group which included, Stephane Tempier, Martin Fanger, Tony Longo, and Gerhard Kershbaumer. I knew I could put time in on the downhills and I would just give it what I had on the final climbs. My calves were cramping but I was putting in time. With half a lap to go I glanced a rock with my tire.... it held air. thinking I had got away with it I was onto the last main climb then....pisssss....pisssss.piissssst. My front tire lost all of it's pressure. it was 2km to the finish and I didn't have enough of a buffer to hold of the chasing group of 5 riders behind. There was only one option, and that was to ride the flat to the finish! I nursed the flat down the fast down hill and then onto the final climb. I was very gutted. Into the finishing shoot called the rabbit hole and the final corners it felt like I was dragging a fridge through sand. (sorry about the bunched up text...no idea what I did there :-))
I finished in 17th, but up until the last 2km I had 13th place pretty much locked in. I had mixed emotions because I had ridden well for 90% of the race. It was just the first 5 and last 5% that I could have done much better on.
Oh well, lucky it was a test event. Hopefully the data was useful as I rode with a power tap even for the race. Thanks to MTBA and CA for there support over the past week in London. It was an honer to put on the Aussie kit again. I might be able to edit some of the footage and upload it this week. I'm not holding my breath because I'm pretty useless at that sort of thing :-)
NEXT RACE: Chech World cup....2 weeks from now.
More posts to come now I'm back at my home base in Offenburg.
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