TBEC Owthorpe Notts 20th June

In my first ever season of racing and being a sprightly 45 years old, I will say to all those thinking about racing, go for it. I have found everyone to be helpful and very friendly this year with help and advice freely available. I would suggest going and helping set the course up the day before the race as this gives you an insight as to what you face and the riding advice from the 'old timers' is invaluable.

We arrived early on Sunday morning, It was overcast and feeling quite cold which would have been ideal for racing. I unloaded my bike and went to check which row I was starting on, row 0 was my starting row. Personally I like to get through scutineering and get my bike on the start line early so I don't have to worry about anything. With this done it's back to the van to eat and drink plenty and get kitted up. The horn sounds and it's time for the pre race briefing. The course is 5.5 miles with 3.5 miles of woodland and 2 miles of fast open fields.

At the start my bike started easily and I was off. Obviously not being able to help set up this time I didn't get a look at the course so was riding blind, so a steady first lap was in order. As I entered the woods it looked fairly open but this soon changed. The woods had a bit of everything and this was becoming apparent. It soon tightened up to single track interspersed with some deep mud. It also had some tricky ditches thrown in for good measure. Then out into the open fields, now these were fast. My bike was revving out in top and I had dropped 4 teeth off of the rear sprocket for this race!

Wednesday 26th May

Better start off by saying a big thank you to Team REME for letting us enter at such short notice. My ride hinged on Simon shoulder feeling better, which he injured breaking up a fight between competitors of all things, but I’ll leave that one for another day…just like the other four race reports that are already outstanding. Well I better cut to the chase before you‘ll doze off.

Terrible start as per usual, a huge dust cloud gets kicked up and there are riders fallen at the first corner, pity the helmet cam decided not to work at this point, though I doubt you would have seen much. What transpired next are possibly the worst two laps I have ever ridden, I had only forgotten how to ride sand that’s what it felt like, a bucket and spade would have proven more useful. Riding in the issuing dust the front tucked under at least twice, then I get rebounded into a tree pretty hard, blimey 1km down 5 to go.