The Inners MTB TT course has to be one of the most testing courses in the UK, and the most fun. You climb for 20 minutes on a mixture of manmade singletrack and natural rooty singletrack, then descent for five minutes down ‘The Tunnel’ and ‘New Luge’ of the DH tracks, followed by the ‘Merida’ singltrack, and finished off by the bottom half of ‘Caddon Bank’. Not much to complain about here, event with all the mud!

Despite the noise, and exclamation from others (JFM!), I did my warmup on my rollers. The mountainbike isn’t nearly as stable on them as the road bike is, but it does give me the chance to get properly warmed up in a controlled environment.

First lap went really well, with the only real problem on the up being harder than expected breathing. On the down I felt in control, despite going way faster than I had been going on the Friday when I practiced the course.

On the second lap I went through right before Ben Thompson, James Fraser-Moodie and Andy Barlow. Ben caught me just before we went into the tunnel. I got a puncture, and while I was stopped Andy went past, closely followed by James. It seemed to be a bad day for punctures, as James got on a few hundred meters later, and Ben got one at the start of his second lap.

With mine quickly fixed I was off again, round into my third lap. The third was pretty uneventful, I pushed almost as hard as I could, saving myself a little for the descent.

Turns out I was fourth, behind Andy, Paul Newnham and Paul McInally. Pretty chuffed with that result especially with my puncture.

So, top training tip people…. take 3 months off the bike with injury, train like a mad person for two weeks, then ride a course that is almost perfectly suited to you.

Here’s hoping the last round of the SXC is held on the same course.

Full results on the SXC Forum