After winning the third round of the Inners TT Series, it made sense to try and do the same at the fourth and final round. A days rest after the last round of the SXC, and I was ready to go.

It was proper dark for this one, so I borrowed a nice bright HID from Tom ‘Wild Boar 24’ Owen. For the first part of the climb I didn’t need it, only the technical sections were worthy of it to start with. After the quarry I turned it off for the fireroad, so as to gain a small psychological advantage over those chasing. I started two minutes ahead of Andy Wardman, and looking back on the fireroad I could see he had already dropped time on me.

After the first bit of the descent it was back to ride-run-ride on the rocky old-skool section. There seemed to be a lot of traffic in this section, as people were having trouble with it. I had an over-the-bars, but got straight back up and off running.

On the descent I kept missing corners, and had to stop at one point to tuck my keys back into my top to stop them whacking me in the face as I went over the drops. Definitely some time wasted there.

I got to the bottom in one piece, phew! Andy Barlow had decided to ride his ‘big’ hardtail today, and even stopped to lower the saddle for more control on the descent. I beat him and Andy Wardman by a single second, taking the series win also, by one point!

Thanks very much to Helen and Steve for all their hard work organising the series, and thanks to all the folk who turned up for all the great banter.

Here’s hoping the rumoured winter series is as good…