Dry trails, crashes and cake - Thetford Winter series round 4

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BY: Paddy Atkinson

Published: 24th February, 2014

Dry trails; summer gloves; brake pads remaining fully intact; and barely a hint of mud! That can't be right.

Despite the rain that had plagued the winter so far, a dry spell (and some excellent work from the Thetford trail fairies) had left a very fast course, with plenty of the trademark Thetford flat out singletrack, including the old favourite downhill 'moto' section, and much loathed undulating ascent of 'double shocker'. Safe to say, with a series win already in the bag, I was looking forward to some furious racing from the final Winter series round.

We arrived at the venue uncharacteristically early, leaving plenty of time for chatting/avoiding having to take off my warm hoodie. Having ridden most of the singletrack in that area of the woods before, I opted not to do a practice lap, but the report from XCracer team mate Ant White and friend Dan (Howe), who'd just returned from a recce lap, was that it was fast and relatively (as will be revisited later) straightforward.

A quick spin up to speed on the rollers and before I knew it, I was on the start line, chatting with some familiar faces as usual. Just after the 4 hour guys, we set off from the grassy pit area and straight into a downright nasty headwind! This made for some road racing style tactics, with almost the whole junior field in a long line. I stayed among the pack all the way up to the first section of singletrack, where I put in a brief sprint to get a clear run. After pulling out a small gap, I settled into a nice rhythm, riding within my limits and waiting for the 2 hour senior guys to catch up - I was determined to not set off too fast and get destroyed by the top seniors towards the end like the last time!

So it was all going to plan, about a quarter around the second lap I got caught up by Jon Pybus, Ant, and the rest of the leading seniors, and promptly latched onto their wheels. This went smoothly, and I didn't feel too pushed by the pace, until Jon lost his front wheel on an awkwardly placed root coming down the last descent before the double shocker climb. I only just avoided running him over! After a quick shout to check that Jon wasn't injured, I set off in pursuit of Chris Lever who had inherited the lead. After tucking onto his wheel through pit area, I grabbed another bottle and gel from the ever busy pit monkey (Dad). Just as I'd got back into a rhythm again, Ant came flying past!

So it was back to battle stations as Ant pushed the pace, and pretty much the same thing happened once more, and a recovered Pybus came hammering past! So we were now in a 3 person train as we flew down the descent, which then became a 2 person, as I hit the deck, in exactly the same place that Jon had on the previous lap!
After twisting my saddle back into an almost straight position and brushing myself down, I pushed on, with only bruised pride to show for my accident. I could see Chris' green kit in the distance, which was good motivation to push on, but unfortunately the gap just wasn't closing. Taking on some more gels as I came around for my final lap, I also managed to choke and dribble sticky gel down my front. Not ideal, but at least some of it had gone down the hatch.

Not much more of interest happened on the last lap, just a bit more pushing on the hills to try and catch Chris, which never happened, and shouting encouragement to some friends in other categories. I did attempt a bit of a celebration over the finish, but it fell a bit flat as I messed it up and almost fell over (again).

Before long it was podium time! Nice to see Ant come in first in the 2 hour vets category, and overall in the race! He said he put in an attack on the second last climb to dispatch a fatigued Jon Pybus, and he came in with a decent margin to spare too.

So both the XCracer/Scimitar riders in attendance (me and Ant) won every round in our categories, winning the series overall with a clean sweep! Now I just need to get around to eating the mountain of Torq bars I've accumulated from the prizes!

As always, thanks to Mum and Dad for their brilliant support, XCracer/Scimitar, and well done to anyone racing!

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