After having sat on the sidelines for the past 12 months as a result of injuries and work commitments, it was time to join the Aussie National Series circuit once again! In company of my training, racing and travelling buddy - Matt Dodd we headed on a road trip from Brisbane Qld to Bright Vic to compete in the final round of the National Downhill Series which was a mammoth drive - about 20 hours each way.
We headed up to Mystic Mountain on Friday for the first practice day and were greeted by a track which is best described as steep, loose and incredibly tight with bar grabbing tree's either side of the track from top to bottom. Having said that, the track was awesome and great fun to ride and puts the word 'downhill' into the correct perspective for our sport! Both Matt and I took our time and worked up to speed during the day but on the last practice run, I made an error of judgement and crashed at high speed resulting in a rolled left ankle. Saturday morning saw a drop in temperatures when we headed up for our first practice run and my ankle was feeling pretty good after treating it through the night.
Matt took off on his first practice run and came unstuck when in a high speed section resulting in him 'shoulder charging' a pine tree which caused his shoulder to dislocate! He limped back down the mountain but was in extreme pain so he decided to sit out practice to see if it would improve - not to be! He had to make the hard decision to call it quits for the weekend as he had no strength in the injured shoulder and the pain was pretty bad. I continued to practice through until Qualifying/Seeding race later in the day. The weather started to turn for the worse with rain beginning to fall so it was a rush to set-up my Santa Cruz V10c for wet weather racing.
As it turned out, not a lot of rain fell and the track remained pretty dry - even dusty in some areas! I headed down on my Qualifying run but on a high speed section of the track my front wheel washed out and I crashed however; I managed to get going again and qualified 15th which I was OK with given my crash!
Race day arrived on Sunday morning and after a good breakfast, Matt and I headed to the track later in the morning. I only did 2 practice runs before my race run late in the afternoon and managed to crash multiple times on each run - bugger! I decided that I would ride the more difficult sections of the track conservatively and open the V10 up on the easier section (not sure there were any easy sections, actually?). I settled into my race run and all was going well until I had a momentary lapse of concentration (in an easier section) and the next thing I was sliding sideways down the track which resulted in me bashing my right knee into something large which ripped my 661 Kyle Strait knee pad off my leg! I got going again and finally charged over the finish line into 10th place outright and achieved the goal I had set myself of a Top 10 finish.
I am pretty stoked with my result particularly with the class of riders I was competing against in Elite Men - Sam Hill, Troy Brosnan, Chris Kovarik, Ben Corey, Connor Fearon, Dave MacMillan, Jack Moir and numerous other top class riders! Now to get home and rest up before heading to Hobart at Easter for the Oceania Champs which I am really looking forward to as Glenorchy is a great track to ride and race.
Finally, to my Supporters - NSDynamics.com.au, Elka Suspension, Chunked.com.au, Mavic Equipment, Maxxis and Santa Cruz Bikes - thank you for your continued support as I get back to racing mode.
After having sat on the sidelines for the past 12 months as a result of injuries and work commitments, it was time to join the Aussie National Series circuit once again! In company of my training, racing and travelling buddy - Matt Dodd we headed on a road trip from Brisbane Qld to Bright Vic to compete in the final round of the National Downhill Series which was a mammoth drive - about 20 hours each way.
We headed up to Mystic Mountain on Friday for the first practice day and were greeted by a track which is best described as steep, loose and incredibly tight with bar grabbing tree's either side of the track from top to bottom. Having said that, the track was awesome and great fun to ride and puts the word 'downhill' into the correct perspective for our sport! Both Matt and I took our time and worked up to speed during the day but on the last practice run, I made an error of judgement and crashed at high speed resulting in a rolled left ankle. Saturday morning saw a drop in temperatures when we headed up for our first practice run and my ankle was feeling pretty good after treating it through the night.
Matt took off on his first practice run and came unstuck when in a high speed section resulting in him 'shoulder charging' a pine tree which caused his shoulder to dislocate! He limped back down the mountain but was in extreme pain so he decided to sit out practice to see if it would improve - not to be! He had to make the hard decision to call it quits for the weekend as he had no strength in the injured shoulder and the pain was pretty bad. I continued to practice through until Qualifying/Seeding race later in the day. The weather started to turn for the worse with rain beginning to fall so it was a rush to set-up my Santa Cruz V10c for wet weather racing.
As it turned out, not a lot of rain fell and the track remained pretty dry - even dusty in some areas! I headed down on my Qualifying run but on a high speed section of the track my front wheel washed out and I crashed however; I managed to get going again and qualified 15th which I was OK with given my crash!
Race day arrived on Sunday morning and after a good breakfast, Matt and I headed to the track later in the morning. I only did 2 practice runs before my race run late in the afternoon and managed to crash multiple times on each run - bugger! I decided that I would ride the more difficult sections of the track conservatively and open the V10 up on the easier section (not sure there were any easy sections, actually?). I settled into my race run and all was going well until I had a momentary lapse of concentration (in an easier section) and the next thing I was sliding sideways down the track which resulted in me bashing my right knee into something large which ripped my 661 Kyle Strait knee pad off my leg! I got going again and finally charged over the finish line into 10th place outright and achieved the goal I had set myself of a Top 10 finish.
I am pretty stoked with my result particularly with the class of riders I was competing against in Elite Men - Sam Hill, Troy Brosnan, Chris Kovarik, Ben Corey, Connor Fearon, Dave MacMillan, Jack Moir and numerous other top class riders! Now to get home and rest up before heading to Hobart at Easter for the Oceania Champs which I am really looking forward to as Glenorchy is a great track to ride and race.
Finally, to my Supporters - NSDynamics.com.au, Elka Suspension, Chunked.com.au, Mavic Equipment, Maxxis and Santa Cruz Bikes - thank you for your continued support as I get back to racing mode.
