Rd 1 VSS State XC Bendigo

The first round of the State XC series was held out at Bendigo this past weekend, I went in to the race very excited for a few different reasons, firstly because I enjoyed the series so much last season and could hardly wait to get back in to it again, then just cos I really enjoyed that track last year and the fact that I could test out my new bike on a track I have raced on before and hopefully after a years riding under my belt I will have drastically improved my times from last year. It was not to be, I knew at least one rider that was to be me competition for the race before I got there so knew I would struggle to beat her, turns out Sharon was to be my only competition for the race, we were started at the back of the field which suited me, Sharon and I took off and I stayed close through the first bit of single track, Sharon was not too far away and I was pushing hard to stay with her, I ended up feeling pretty crook pushing too hard to keep with her so backed off and decided to just go at my pace , next I saw of Sharon she was a fair way off and any idea I had of perhaps beating her were out the window.

Went through the end of the first lap with 2 more to go and with some familiar faces at transition cheering me on this managed to spur me on a bit, at least within seeing distance of them anyway, I knew I had no chance of winning or even coming close to it and it was really getting me down, the fact that I knew my lap times were similar to last year was really getting me down too, yes the track was a bit different to last years race but pretty much the same, so I thought I should have done a lot better than that.

Brett Henderson in action

Jenni King, 2nd Elite female
Brett is so good he can do it with his eyes closed!
My lap times were pretty woefull, first lap was 33 mins, second and third both 39 minutes, the extra 6 minutes per lap being the time I wasted stopping to let riders past, I GOTTA STOP DOING THAT!!!!! Sharon finished with lap times of 27, 28 and 29 minutes, a total of 26 minutes faster than me over the entire race

To be continued............................

On second thoughts thats all I have to say about the race, have to do the write up for the Kona and honestly cant be bothered with this one anymore, you get the idea anyway, race was run and I came last, pretty simple really.

Happy biking

Kat

Officer 6 Hour

1st place for me and my mixed 4's team, unfortunately we were the only team of that kind so cant take any credit for 1st place there.

Awesome course except for the killer hill I now know is also known as heartbreak hill and for good reason, was a toughy, didn't make it up it once but I was not the only one doing the walk of shame so dont feel too bad about it. The course had some pretty tough downhill sections that I have no doubt that if I were still riding my shitty GT I would never had made it down or perhaps would have but would have done it by going over the bars that's for sure, the new bike handles so well, it's amazing the difference it has made, my times were 8 minutes slower than the riders I am usually 15 minutes slower than so I guess if I look at it that way I am 7 minutes faster based on the new bike and I guess the training on the roadie can take some credit for it too.

So the day started off with me rocking up to the race with the new bike to show off to anyone that wanted to see it or otherwise, nobody had any choice in the matter really, I was like a proud parent showing off a new bub, so anyway first pit stop was Duncan, Dave and Rowan, Duncan felt my tire and it was pretty much dead flat and in true Kat style I had no idea about it until he pointed it out, dropped the bike off to Mick and pointed out my flat tyre and pretty much left him to it, I am so spoilt, whenever Croydon Cycleworks have the tent there I don't have to worry about anything, just rock up and race, Mick always makes sure my bike is ready to go, I can do what I do best, socialise, but there was a race on and I was very serious today and wanted to do really well on the new bike, my team consisted of Nick, Jamie Tom and myself, the guys quickly decided that I should do the first lap, yeah thanks guys! this meant that I would probably end up doing the most laps, as it turned out lap times were pretty quick and we all managed 3 laps for the day, so we take off at the start line and head up the fire trail to the first little pinch climb and here we have a huge traffic jam, very slow going here, up the climb and in to a fast downhill section followed another climb back up past the car park and down to a very step downhill run, there are alot of people watching so didn't even hesitate and hit it as fast as I could, was a bit scary but was so stoked that I made it down, my other bike would have not got me down it or might have but would have not pulled me up on the end of it that's for sure, gotta love disk brakes! After here it was off in to some sweet singletrack and that killer climb, first lap here I nearly threw up, I had a conversation with a friend the night before and his voice was in my head the whole time just telling me to go hard, so I pushed as hard as I could until it was just too steep for my wimpy legs and my lungs were just about bursting, I jumped off and walked along with the 20 other riders that were just ahead of me nearly throwing up just trying to breathe, after this section it was on to a fire trail along the dam wall and on to a very sketchy downhill bit, no point trying to do this bit half arsed, just hit Iit and hung on managing to stay upright over the loose rocks down through some more sweet singletrack and over some tough pinch climbs on to another couple of killer hills and then to my favourite part of the track, not too sure if it is so good cos you know you just have to finish this downhill bit then have one last little climb to the finish or if it really is that enjoyable,anyway it is a really fast flowy downhill section with a few little jumps and a whole lotta fun! I completed my first lap in about 38 minutes, not very fast but great for me considering I would usually be about 45 minutes on a track like that, hard to compare as I have not ridden that exact course but just know from what I would usually do compared to the others.

I had a great day and not one crash for the day, would have to be a first for me, although I had a few close calls that really would have hurt had I not managed to keep it together, I loved the course and my teammates were alot of fun, we have a new member to the Croydon Cycleworks team, Jenni King raced in a mixed pair with the very fast Brett Henderson, together they came away with the top spot for today and an awesome effort on both the parts to do as many laps as they did on that course and as quick as they did it.

The day ended with me being roped in to being the trophy giver outer at presentations, not exactly my style but helped out none the less, relaxing at home now before my first day at my new job tomorrow, after having 2 weeks off I am not at all excited about my new job, would love another 2 off! 2 weeks of shopping too so there are some big decisions to be made tonight, what to wear, what to wear????

Well that's enough of my ramblings for one night.

Thankyou's for today

Croydon Cycleworks, Mick Jamison for all his help, my team mates Nick, Jamie and Tom oh and Steve Clausen for letting me take his brand spanking new titanium Baum bike for a spin, very nice bike indeed, although not as good as the Trek Elite 9.7 of course :)

Until next time Happy Biking

Kat

I am in love!

With the new bike that is, picked it up today and took it for a spin out at Lysterfield, ah, such a dream to ride, straight away I could notice the difference in speed getting up the climbs and being able to get out of the saddle and pedal over roots which was one thing I just couldnt do on the GT, with front forks that dont work and trying to get a heavy metal bike over roots just didnt work, the Trek just glides over the top of it all and I always thought that I couldnt lift my front wheel over rocks and logs just cos I didnt have the technical skills to do it, I guess having a bike that has front forks that actually work is all I needed, was easily lifting my front wheel and bunny hopping over everything, oh, the brakes on this thing are pretty touchy too, having gone from V brakes to the disk brakes is a huge difference, nearly went over the bars the first time I really had to use them, cant wait to race this thing and see how it goes, have the Katmandu Adventure race this Saturday then the Officer 6 hour Enduro Sunday so will get plenty of racing hours in on it before the first round of the State XC at Bendigo, can hardly wait for that one!

Just want to say thanks to everyone that has helped me along the way, especially the guys at Croydon Cycleworks, I am so lucky to have their support, I have made alot of friends from being involved in this sport, they know who they are and I really appreciate their support and interest in me and my racing.

Until next time Happy biking, I know I certainly will have plenty of it on the new bike!

Kat

Round 1 MTB Nationals Adelaide

Thursday saw me and travel partner Duncan Murray head off to Adelaide for the first round of the Nationals at Eagle Mountain Bike Park, finished up my last day of work at my current job on the Thursday so after a few goodbye's I headed off to Northcote to pick up Duncan and by about 6 pm we were on the road and on our way to our first pit stop Nhill, we rocked up at the motel at about 11.30pm, was as dodgy in the room as it was from what we could see from the outside, was pretty tired from the drive so all I wanted was a nice shower and to jump in to bed, Duncan bagged the double bed and had the single, jumped in the shower only to have a light mist of water to stand under, was the worst shower ever! The curtains had cob webs all ver them and it was not all that clean, it's ok I told myself, only have to sleep and get outta here early, jumped in bed and pretty much sunk in the middle of it and that's where I stayed, could barely roll over the bed was that saggy, time to get some sleep, or so I thought, we were on the main highway with trucks roaring past every minute and the odd freight train, I reckon I managed 10 minutes of deep sleep for the whole night, could not get out of there quick enough in the morning.

So we headed off for Adelaide first thing and made it to the track for a pre ride of the course by about 11.30am, got the bikes out and took off for a spin around the track, a quick loop around the Short Course XC track then straight up in to some switchbacks, this is where I had my first stack for the weekend, nothing major but put me in one of my moods first up, Duncan made his way to the top pretty quickly and kept waiting for me to catch up to offer help over any technical stuff along the way, made it to the top and then came to my first rocky step up, mucked up again going over that and started having negative thoughts about doing the race and was wondering why I was even there, started cracking it with myself which just made me muck even more, so I had a bit of a hissy fit and just wanted to be left alone so told Duncan to go ahead and I would catch him at the end of the track, I took a few minutes to myself on the side of the track to get it together and after a bit of a climb the track led to an awesome fast section with some nice jumps and down through some really nice singletrack, this was enough to make me snap out of my mood and I really started to enjoy it from here on in. The track would actually be one my fav's now, it was alot fun and mixed with smooth and rocky sections with no massive climbs and nice downhill sections to recover.

Saturday morning comes around and it is one hour away from my race start, I am as nervous as ever and trying to calm my nerves by just hanging around watching the first race for the day and keeping myself hydrated, Duncan suggests I should head off and get changed in to my gear and go for a warm up ride, head off to get changed and the announcer starts calling all the female competitiors to the start line to get transponders fixed to their bikes, so big rush to get changed and get ready to go, get on the start line and we have about 20 minutes before our race is due to start, this is making my nerves even worse, I checked out the opposition and they looked pretty fit for Sport class, started playing the race over in my head and had a plan to try and stick behind them for the whole race then overtake if I could. We finally get called to the official start line and the gun goes off, nerves are in overdrive now, gotta stick with the bunch at least for the part where the crowd can see, found it easy to stay with them through the Short Course track and was braking most of the way through as I was too close to them so felt I could stick with them for the race if they kept that pace, that was until we hit the switchbacks, I went in to it in front of one other rider and was struggling to stay close to the other girls, had my first stack here which was what I was most worried about as there were quite a few people watching, so let the other rider in front and tried to stay with her, she got away up the climb and I caught her back on the descent, I passed her here and then she managed to catch me again on the next climb where she got back in front again, I rode my butt off throught the next downhill section and caught her again and passed her only to crash in front of her and let her get past again, washed off the dirt and blood with my water jumper back on and caught her yet again, past her again and it remained that way for the rest of the lap, I went through that lap about 3 minutes in front and was confident I could keep that lead, she caught me again on the next climb and I had another little stack and that was the end for me, I didnt catch her again after that, then the Elite women started coming through so spent alot of time pulling over to let them through.

I ended up with 3rd in Womens Sport at my first Nationals event, shame there were only 3 of us entered in the race! I heard them calling me for presentations but was too embarrassed to go up and collect my trophy for 3rd and last place so went up to collect it after, it is a cool trophy after all.

The next round of the Nat's I will be doing will be at the You Yang's so will be spending the next 6 weeks out there training when I can, hopefully will give me the home track advantage.

Overall I had a great weekend and was awesome to see the Elite guys and girls at it out there and just motivates me more to do better next time.

Kat

New bike arrives on Friday!

Ok this is it, have changed my mind plenty of times over the last few months but having been told I would have to wait until mid January for the Top Fuel I have decided to get the Trek Elite 9.7 instead, a little dearer than the Top Fuel but carbon frame, heaps lighter and better components make it worth it, also Croydon Cycleworks and Trek have helped me out with it too so very excited to be getting a bike like this I otherwise would not have been able to get without their help. Was not too keen on the colour at first but we get our new gear in a few weeks and wont be the standard red I usually get around in so will match the new gear and we all know us girls are all about colour co-ordination

So here it is

So excited! Wont be doing any more races on the dodgy GT anymore, not too sure that it will make me any faster but will definitely make my ride alot more comfortable having a bike this light and forks that actually do what they are supposed to do, hopefully will get rid of the problems I have been having with my shoulder and being on the correct size bike will help a great deal too.

Many many thanks to Mick Jamison @ Croydon Cycleworks and Trek for helping me out with the bike.

Uuuuh, 4 more sleeps!

Will post on the Adelaide Nat's in the next few days just trying to organise photos from the photographers there.

Until next time happy biking!

Kat