Riding with Frishi

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BY: Niall Frost

Published: 28th April, 2010

A lot has been written about the world cup weekend and I thought I would bring a bit of my experience from the event which was somewhat surreal!

Friday night saw the Pickering Pro Sprint Eliminator which was really well supported by the town.   Crowds many people deep were entertained by a Dragon and St George running up and down the main straight holding noise contests and did a great job getting the crowd going.  The first few races were really close with Nick Craig and Gary Foord making it through to the second round and causing the dragon to nearly fall over backwards with excitement.  Unfortunately no Brit made it to the final but it was eye opening how far the riders pushed themselves.  I will learn from this for the Wasing Park team relay, possibly....

My world cup really started with the Dalby Dare on the Saturday.  There were loads of entries lining up early and I was fortunate to squeeze into somewhere around the 4th row of what must have been over 200 people ready to tackle the world cup course and extended dare course.  From the off I was concentrating on getting through the pack and near the front to let loose on the awesome Dalby singletrack.  Up to dingleby summit and I was aware of a rider on my wheel who told me I'd got a nice gap which was pleasing as I'd only just got past fellow 29'er Jeroen Kooij.

The rider came through before the climb out of worry gill and much to my amazement it was Thomas Frischknecht who had been announced on the start line.  Even more crazy was after a further lap he hadn't dropped me, although given that he was asking how many laps it was I don't think he was taking it too seriously.  Riding along and chatting to Thomas was good fun and although we were nipping along at a fair pace it was obvious that he wasn't trying as hard as I was.  I think that's called stating the obvious.

I followed down a lot of the descents and climbs and it was just amazing to watch how much better he was than me.  There wasn't so much difference on the descents, but on the climbs he just made it look effortless.   Even better was that at the summit of the main singletrack climb on the dare course Thomas eased up so that I could catch up.  I won't lie, I'm fully aware of the skill difference here!

Nevertheless after he had baited me on the finish straight by dropping gears and after a bit of half wheeling I gave in and sprinted over the line.  Well, who wouldn't want to finish ahead of a world cup and mountain biking legend?
Sunday I marshalled at point 5, just where the start loop led into the main course.  I'd like to say a big thank you to all the patient spectators who were very courteous.  I have to admit I was trying to catch as much of the racing as possible, particularly when fellow Scot Dave Henderson appeared well up the field.  A bit of manic shouting each lap was the best I could do to help, sorry Dave.  The racing was incredible and I hope everyone had good time either at Dalby or on Freecaster.tv.

See you at enduro6.

Niall
Thanks to my sponsors Gary Fisher, Accelerade and Exposure lights.