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Due to knee issues in February, I was never going to repeat my stellar result from 2010, but did hope to do at least get a top-10. The latest iteration of the popular Sherwood Pines course was shortened and had lost anything that you would call a climb. It was a pure dirt crit, all accelerations, with little on the course to benefit less strong, and more technically adept riders.
I was gridded on the front row, but was losing places fast off the start. I tried to settle but was having a hard time winding things up on the forestry road sections. One amusement in the first lap was having someone pass me into one of the twisty-bombhole sections, and then slow right up. I shouted at them to get a move on, stopping short of making some sort of roadie-scum comment. They pulled over and let me past, result! Turns out they thought I was a junior, and couldn’t make out what I was actually shouting.
I slowly faded throughout the race, not really feeling the love for the course. I knew I was having a bad day when on the fourth lap I was passed by Nick Evans, at this point, all enthusiasm was gone.
I rolled in for 27th, 9 minutes down on winner Lee Westwood.
Full results courtesy of TimeLaps.
Round 1 of the BMBS hit up Sherwood Pines. The course wasn’t really my cup of tea; very little climbing, nothing technical, and fast forestry-road followed by tight singletrack with no passing.
I didn’t get a great start, and despite being gridded on the third row, I got into the first singletrack in about 40th place. This made the first two laps very frustrating, as I had to jump whole groups of people just before every singletrack to save getting stuck behind them walking or just going slowly to get a rest in.
By the third lap I was with a group going at a similar pace to mine, along with some other Scots; Greig Walker (ERC), Jack Richards (Deeside Thistle), and Steven Halsall (VCM). JoJo was doing my bottles at the second feed zone, so I decided not to have a bottle for the first lap as it would be very close to the finish. This plan worked against me though, as I dropped my last bottle shortly after the feed zone, meaning I had to do a lap and a half with no bottle.
Going into the last lap Greig was pointing at his rear wheel frantically, making sure I got into his slipstream before we hit the forestry road and the headwind out of the start-finish area. This I did, and we jumped the rider we were drafting about halfway along, and powered into the singletrack. Halfway round Greig popped out of his pedal on the only steep climb of the race (Still big-ring material though), so I went around him and put the foot down. I gained a few more places during the remainder of the race, placing nicely in 9th, within my target of a top 10. Greig finished in 11th, Steven in 17th and Jack in 22nd.
Results can be read over at Timelaps.
