Alps, Finland, Glasgow, Ardennes, Brighton!

Back at the start of July a group of us headed out for the MB Race in the Alps.  This is a 70/100/140km endurance race with up to 7000m of climbing.  Last year, conditions were exceptional with temperatures over 35 degrees.  This year, it was a little different.  The preceding week had seen mainly sunshine and Ben and co had been enjoying riding the local trails.  I flew out to join them on Friday evening to a forecast of thunderstorms and rain.  Good times.  The race starts early - 6am - and so by the time I got to the house at 10pm everyone else was asleep.  We were up early at 4am to make sure we got to the start in good time and were greeted with an overcast but dry morning.  It wasn't to last though - the organisers warned us of "at least one dangerous thunderstorm" which would pass over during the day.  Nothing like a good bit of French understatement.  We set off up the first climb (more of a pimple really) and were soon riding in woods so dark I had to descend with my sunglasses held in my mouth.  The storms were coming...  And they certainly arrived as we rode up the first proper mountain.  It looked like we were riding up into the end of the world - the lightening was biblical and it was absolutely chucking it down.  Tim and I rode up together, stopping to put rain jackets on.  We reached the top and what had been fast, hardpacked singletrack the previous day (or so I was told!) was now a slippery mess.  After about 20-30 minutes of sliding around all over the place we ended up at feed 1; Ben had decided enough was enough so Tim and I had a little chat and said we'd go for the 70km race and decide there if we would continue.  The pattern broadly continued for the rest of the race; we would variously ride uphill in grey cloud with no visibility, more lightening, more heavy rain followed by walking through deep clay which made the bikes impossible to even push.  The final 6km along the top of the last mountain ridge was just epic; we averaged about 3mph.  Overall we finished 10th and 11th in the 6hr 70km race having done about 3500m of ascent.  We decided it just wasn't worth wrecking the bikes and ourselves by continuing when it just wasn't fun!!  But we will be back in 2017...

Next up was a little weekend trip to Helsinki - I had intended to enter a double header of an XC and an Endurance race that weekend but due to car hire timings I ended up just going for a ride.  The area north of Helsinki was a gravel grinders dream with miles and miles of empty gravel roads across the Nukksio National Park.  A cool city.

I headed up to Glasgow for the National XC champs; a course I'd really enjoyed a couple of years back despite giving myself heatstroke after the (very hot) race by spraying myself with my (very cold) Dirtworker to cool off.  Oops.  No risk of that happening again though, as despite nice warm temperatures in the South it was absolutely freezing in Glasgow!  I practiced the course and found it had worn in a lot since we were last there; lots more exposed roots and rocks and some tricky sections.  The rain beforehand had made the surface very slippery in parts and I struggled to get the power down.  In the race, I lasted 3/7 laps then got a cut in the tyre whilst running in the top 20, which was irritating after having travelled so far to race.  Numbers were definitely down at the Champs this year which was a shame.

At the start of August, I headed out to the Ardennes with my parents for what was supposed to be the BEMC one day endurance race, but it was cancelled so I just went for a couple of rides instead.  I found parts of the Roc Ardenens course from back in May, only this time they were dry and dusty!  I love the Ardennes - it's so stunningly pretty and there is some brilliant riding.  There's also a lot of very good beer which filled the car on the way home!  My parents had a great day at the annual carnival in Houffalize when I went for a ride - La Chouffe on draught for €2 meant they had a really good day!

This past weekend I went to the Brighton Big Dog 6hr solo race - a real favourite of mine and, in the dry, one of the best courses anywhere.  The descents are super-fast and well worth the climbs - even Badgers didn't seem so bad when you knew what was coming next :) the marshalls did an amazing job encouraging the riders - special mention to the banterous chap at the bottom of A&E - you really made me laugh each time round.  The race fell on my wedding anniversary and so Nicky found herself handing up bottles and bananas - although I hope that a relaxing Sunday wandering round the Lanes made up for it!! I was aiming to et a podium again and all was going well until lap 4.  I was about 5mims down on Tim and Ben and 5 mins up on 4th.  Then I got terrible cramp which meant I lost about 4mins in one go as it had to stop and stretch it out.  Once I got going again I could tell I had to be very careful not to overdo it; Nicky kept me fed and watered (I would stop and down a bottle of water each lap, then take an energy and electrolyte drink round the lap with me).  I think I'd overdone it the day before by riding for 4hrs in the heat and probably dehydrated myself a bit.  At one point the gap to 4th was down to 30secs and I knew I had to push on - this was hard to do with 3hrs left to race but I really wanted that podium place.  My last 5 laps were all a bit quicker than the previous one and my final lap took a minute off the rest.  I ended up 3rd but only 1min30secs ahead of 4th; what a race!  Ben won again, shaking why he's National Marathon Champion, but this year Tim had a great race and pushed him all the way - the results say he won by a lap but in reality it was about 5-6minutes because of the way the cutoffs work.  A great result for Tim.

On Sunday we stopped by Small Batch Coffee - a team sponsor - nice to see where it comes from!

Now we only have the National Marathon Champs left to race; it's a tough, technical and hilly course so should be a decent ride!

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