Tubs. Velo Cafe Magasin

Tubular tyres.

Mythical creatures to some; each hand crafted by the creator, who knows each and every thread per inch; reserved only for those truly in pursuit of the 'Cross.
Those who have wished friend and family farewell, making the dive deep into the Cyclocross realms, never to return to normality. Those bitten by a life-sucking beast, surviving only through the weekly drip of SVENNESS. Those you'll find in Tesco wondering which hand position Sven would use on the trolley.

Each year, Autumn arrives, the leaves begin to fall and the Cyclocrossers slowly appear from behind the trees. Here they have been hibernating since National Champs; waiting, wondering, watching for the raindrops. The 'off season', precisely periodised. The post Nationals crash; news still trickling in from far and near, memories in blossom; too soon to accept the reality, that the beautiful pain and euphoria of cyclocross racing is over for another year. Then, through turmoil and tribulation, we admit that we can no longer shun reality, and depression devours us. But we are stronger than that. We are made of sterner stuff. If the 'Cross has taught us anything it is that there is hope, there is a redeemer.
Internet browsers are slowly, almost embarrassingly opened. Yes it's only March, but no-one else can see me? Maybe I'll catch a bargain on Ebay now the season's over? Justification. Distorted reality. We are masters.
Ideas are generated, research is gathered; will I go single ring this year? Are disc brakes fashionable yet? Pro bike set-ups scrutinized from valve extension to headset spacer.

April, May, June, July; long summer's nights and grand tours to watch, we find ample distraction, but can't deny the little smile in our brains each time we pass by the 'cross bike in the garage. Before we know it, the road/mtb season hasn't quite gone to plan, injured this, broken that, didn't have enough toast before that race etc. But wait, what's that? Yep, only 3 months til 'cross season!

The nights fall in, summer season wraps up, throws a scarf on and gets its wellies out. Shiny new things ordered and fitted, maybe even new bar tape if we're feeling a good season coming; wearing running shoes dug out of the cupboard under 9 months of more important things; maybe we'll go for a run later? Or tomorrow... maybe the day after.

It was about this time I'd been in to Velo Cafe Magasin in Belfast. Joe Henry was a bit of a hero in finding me a straight pull spoke long enough for a Syncros 29er wheel, no other shop in the country seemed to have one! We got talking Cyclocross; because from 1st September you probably can't escape the topic if you enter into conversation with a 'crosser, and I aired my dreams of riding tubular tyres this year.



The Cyclocross tubular is sheltered from the hopeful attacks of amateurs by the arduous gluing process, the price, the risk of rolling, the risk of puncturing. Indeed the clincher will do. It is black, it is round. But alas, it is not enough for some. Whether in their heads or on the course, some are pushing the boundaries of humanity. Some need that 0.5psi less. Some are pioneering lean-angles seen only previously seen through beer goggles, and rims with walls simply aren't an option.

With no rim walls, and either a thin latex tube inside, or no tube at all, the risk of pinch-flats are eliminated, allowing much lower pressures, and the grip and rolling resistance #GAINZ that follow, with maybe some weight savings too. Indeed, to those who have not tried, it seems a lot of faff, a lot of money and a lot of risk; a big old denominator to balance.

But really, if you're interested in going fast at all, you've taken a risk or two in your time. This one can't wait any longer. Roger is still lapping you and hasn't even started sweating yet. How much more of that can you take?

I made the decision I was gonna go 'tubs', but that meant new wheels, and buying new things takes me about a year of internetting to make sure I'm spending my money as best as I can. I'm actually a bit scared of the thought. There's still an almost completed excel spreadsheet back in my documents from this time last year.

Then came a message from Joe himself; 'Hey Monty, you still looking some carbon wheels for cross?'. Gonna be a goood one. He was up for donating me some handbuilt tubular babies for the season to see how they held up to 'that sort of riding'. Now I don't know exactly what he was implying by 'that sort of riding', but I was sure up for giving them a rattle. Joe is one of the best wheel-builders in the country so I was pretty stoked on getting some great wheels without having to get the spreadsheet fired up again. Cyclocross is pretty brutal on parts; every kind of mud under the clouds, regular powerwashing etc. A visit to a good shop like VCM will keep you right on wiping your rims right and washing your nipples n' stuff.

 

'Ride the shit out of them' he said, and ride the shit out of them I did, and still am. Turned up to my first race like a little kid taking his new toys out for the first time after Christmas. No. Probably more excited actually. Anyway, I won that race, and I was a convert. The practice laps were a little squirmy; adjusting to new feels from the ground, but once the gate dropped and I got hammering, they were incredible. Honestly. Life changing stuff. Grip by the lorry-load. Absolutely transformed the bike from the old Shimano R500s & Maxxis Mudwrestlers! All ye of clinchers; imagine being able to turn in corners rather than slide through them? I know; mental; but believe me; it's possible!

Race win was followed by race win, and race win, and I think they've now won 4 races and been on 6 podiums. I'm not sure I'd ever have got round to buying tub wheels and tyres this season, and would've been plodding round the top 15 wondering where all my Wattz were going, so Joe Henry and Velo Cafe Magasin deserve a massive, massive thank-you! If you too are thinking about making the jump, go for it. Sometimes the roady pro's race clinchers, but there's good reason why you've never seen or heard of the Cyclocross #PROZ on clinchers, ever.

Benefits? You'll probably save a bit of weight over clinchers - obviously depends what you're changing from and to - 30-50mm deep rim will keep a bit more mud on the course rather than your bike, and be pretty strong too. You'll save a few precious watts from less rolling resistance over the equivalent clincher tread. Extra grip from a more flexible casing; better cornering; bet you've never even thought of how heavy that extra mud is when you crash! Extra grip and bump absorption from being able to run lower pressures. Ride up hills. Ride off cambers. Ride off cliffs. Do whatever you want, you look bloody #PRO.

If you're thinking of a new bike, I'd recommend not going for the top model, going a model or 2 down, and heading into VCM to get some tubular wheels built up and some advice on tyres. You never know, you could end up riding a World Cup in the same season!

Monty outttt.

http://www.velocafemagasin.com/
10 Cromac Ave,
Belfast,
County Antrim
BT7 2JD

National Championships 2014 - Fossa Wood, Killarney

The boat was late. Almost 45mins. Somebody tell me how an 8hr boat can be late? Surely you could speed it up like 0.5mph or something to get there on time? After being 48hrs late myself, I didn't exactly have time to throw away, this wasn't great.

Nonetheless, when we finally got docked, opening the door into Norn' Irish air was a pretty dreamy feeling after the last 2 days. Fortunately, the Leon started, and I was finally off on the last leg of my journey, into a beautiful Belfast sunset. Seeing a sunrise and sunset in the same day in the middle of Summer isn't something I'd want to be at all to regularly though! Big fan of sleep!

Home!

I knew Sunday's National Champs were in Killarney. I knew Killarney was down south, but til this point (Thursday night, 22:30, leaving in 9hrs) I hadn't checked how far down South it was. I kind of guessed it wouldn't be pleasant news, so was in no rush to find out, but eventually I thought I better check. I took a deep breath and loaded Google maps up on Drumaghadone Rd's finest 0.5mb/sec broadband. About a 5hr drive. Savage -ly horrific.

Thankfully Cameron McIntyre's dad, Graham had offered to give me a lift, not having to drive down myself was epic! We arrived on Friday afternoon at about 1.30pm and met up with James & Simon Curry who were already there to get a tour of the course.

Man. Sherwood Pines it was not! My first lap was an absolute shambles. Coming from racing Sherwood Pines the week before; 14mph avg. proper flat out grassy field, no hills so no descents kind of stuff, I'd completely forgotten how to ride a bike on Irish uppy-downy tight twisty technical stuff... so I just sat around and complained about my tyre choice. :)

In all fairness though, I had a Bontrager 29-0 on the front and Schwalbe Thunderburt on the back. And it was a little damp.

Anyway, lap 2 was better once I roughly knew what to expect, but we decided that was plenty and finished up for the day. I went off and got my Racing Ralph on the front for Saturday's practice.

Things had dried up on Saturday, and after a bit of a lie in and a nice late breakfast I headed out on course for some more practice. I knew I'd plenty of time, so just tried to treat it like a DH race from the good old days and take it bit by bit, finding the 'best' lines and riding them on repeat til I couldn't do them wrong. Whether they were the best lines or not I don't really know. Gareth Mckee could have probably came down and taken one look around and knocked about 30seconds off a lap, but I was content; just knowing where I'm going is half the battle and would hopefully prevent me doing stupid stuff mid-race.

Myself and Matt Adair had taken a run down to Lidl on Friday night to get some food for the weekend. I'd had my hands on the pasta, the usual cyclist go-to for getting the carbs in, but then noticed that I could get twice the amount of rice for the same price. So 1kg of rice I bought, for about £1.50, and set myself the challenge of trying to get through a family's feeding for a week, in 2 days. Sure why not have 750g carbs in ya. So back from Saturday practice, it was rice time... as was basically every time other than sleep time and bike riding time.

Some heavy rain came early Saturday evening, and this would effect the course massively. I didn't reckon it would be any disadvantage to me as I can handle a bicycle ok, but sunshine & no muddy bikes, kit or eyes is always welcome! There were some support races on on Saturday evening, and the rain had just about stopped again, so I took a dander up to check the state of the course and see how messy bikes were getting. Sure enough it was pretty darn muddy! Bikes and riders coming back plastered in mud. Hopefully the rain would stay away, and the ridiculous heat would come in useful to dry the place out a bit... or everyone who'd done their practice on Saturday afternoon on dusty trails in bright sunshine would be a bit nervous on the start!

Sunday morning rice-time came, so I got that down me and headed up to the course to see what was happening. Things had dried out well overnight, and with our race not until 2pm and no rain forecast, conditions looked like they were going to be pretty similar to Saturday afternoon. 

But first, more rice. Lol. Staying at the hostel just a 2min walk from the course made life very easy.

I pulled the fine purple skinsuit on, and got on the bike for a bit of a warmup around 1.30, and soon enough we were being called to the line for gridding. With not doing many Irish NPS rounds this year I was 2nd last on the grid... but with 6 starters and 5 people per row, we managed to fit in all 6 so all was good for everyone. In fact Matt, who was gridded #1, was the furthest from the first corner, I didn't quite understand that one, but I was 2nd closest, so didn't really mind!

Man every time I write a blog I get to this stage and try to remember what was used to start the race. Whistle? Gun? Shout?.. every time I can't remember. I'll leave that to your imagination, rubber duck or something. Anyway, the race was underway. I got clipped in, but not before Sean Feeney and Gavin O'Connell were halfway up the field already. Got chasing and was a comfortable 3rd through the first few downhill corners. The course then looped through the field a bit so I was able to get around everybody on the next uphill.

A good start was crucial as once out of the field it was into tight twisty singletrack with no passing places, you'd be stuck there basically til the course came back into the field again halfway through the lap. 

Once out front, I pushed on, not flat out, but at good pace to try and get the gap to 2nd place growing as rapidly as possible. Out of sight out of mind 'n all that. As U23, we'd started off 1min 20 behind the elites, so by the end of the first lap I was already about halfway through the elite field and had over 1min gap to 2nd place U23. Good times! Kept the pace up, trying to pick off all the elites. Graham Boyd, in 4th was next, then had a bit of a boring lap out on my own, but then caught sight of Sean Prendiville and Ray O'Shaunassey battling it out for 2nd & 3rd elite spot and got chasing. Lost a little time on this lap (4/5) getting held up behind back markers on such a tight track, but imagined I had a good lead in the U23 so tried to give people a bit of time to get out of the road.

Got by Sean & Ray towards the end of lap 4, then it was the final lap, 1st U23 and only 19 times National XC Champion Robin Seymour up ahead in the elite race. Sean stuck with me for the first half of the lap, so it was pretty nice to have someone on my tail to keep me pushing on. Coming through the field halfway through the lap I heard Martin Grimley over on the speakers at the start/finish saying that Matt Adair (2nd U23) was just coming through, so I knew I had half a lap - a good 9mins advantage by this stage - this was a pretty nice feeling to say the least! All was left was to cross the line.

As I came into the field for the final time, I'd done it. No more roots or U-turns to navigate, no more drops or jumps, just a ride up a grass hill and turn into the finish straight. STOKED.

U23 Irish XC Champion by almost 10mins, Irish champ for the 4th year in a row, and 35secs faster over the 5 laps than Elite Champ Robin Seymour. Job's a good'un!

Was only left with about 100g of rice in the end.

Massive thanks to Graham McIntyre for the lift and doing my bottles.

Thanks to Sean Rowe for the use of his great photos!

Next up I'll be travelling back over to England for the last British XC round mid August. With 40 UCI points from the champs I'll hopefully get a more reasonable gridding position and should be able to get a decent race done!

Had planned to stay on in England for Uni in October. But now that I'm in Ireland I realise that another 2 months in England is a bloody long time... so might just come back here after BXC 5, which would allow me to do the Ulster XC Champs at the fantastic venue of Castlewellan. If finances allow!

Monty, out.

Car-nage

As I sit on the Stena Merseyside; or whatever she’s called; we’re not on best terms, I guess I could fit a blog post into the 8hr sailing while I wait for thismorning’s Strava file to upload on the boat’s out of this world WiFi. As in, the satellite must be lost. How often does it take longer to upload the ride than actually do the ride? Think I could get a world first? 30mins in. 10miles in. The race is on.

Yes. 20mph. On me mtb. Years of training culminating in a race to my car. Unfortunately within the first 30mins I’d already taken a wrong turn, or rather not taken the turn at all. It’s like Loughborough just couldn’t bear me leaving. But alas, I was up for a fight, foggy dual carriageway at 5am or not, I’ll just keep going straight and see what happens. Turning back kills ego. Murder is best avoided.

Darn, the ride is uploaded. Beaten. Such has been the pattern for the last 2 days. Get a boat home. Ride some bikes. Enjoy some Northern Irish Summer... or not. Why would the life of Mont ever be that simple? Haha. I was down at the first hurdle. After a quick run into Loughborough to pick up some boxes from Alice, it was home, James, home; for all of 2 miles before one of the Mighty Leon’s dials died, and red lights started flashing. I say the ‘Mighty Leon’, because until it hit English air, we’d owned it for 4 years and it had given no trouble whatsoever. You potentially have to see Mum’s gear changes (or lack thereof) for yourself to understand the achievement of the little motor. Mum & Dad were awesome enough to let myself and sister Alice bring it to Loughborough, so I drove it over at Easter.

And within 2 weeks we had problems, Houston. Dead battery, stuck on a layby on the main road into Loughborough. Great. Safe spot. Tried jumping it, unfortunately this didn’t work. Firmly in battery heaven. Better still, in the process of attempted jumping, bumping, and everything else we could think of, we’d opened the passenger door. Harmless, you’d assume? Ass; u, me. Only the driver door has an outside lock, everything else is electric. Electrics require batteries. Situation update: dead battery, stuck on a layby on the main road into Loughborough, passenger door unlocked, about 10.30pm.

It was bound to get broken into. But at least it wouldn’t be going far without a battery. I visualized Christmas coming early to some Leon fancying opportunist, and then them trying to start it and nothing happening. Someone to share the feels with at least.

As always, if all else fails; cable ties and duct tape. Wrapped around the passenger seat headrest down to the door handle, you’d have to rip the door panel off to open it any more than a centimetre. A couple of bike locks and a duvet cover to cover the DIY door lock and I headed to bed at about 1am with all body parts crossed. This is the first time my parents will hear this. Haha. You chose to read it.

Fort Knox

Somehow it didn’t get broken into, although one night when I went up to check, the road-side chip portakabin thing right beside had been. Butt clenching times. Eventually was able to get a new battery up to it and fitted, and we were Mighty again. Then it needed MOT’d and taxed, In the middle of exams too. Try taxing a NI registered car in England. Or don’t; much better better idea! Trying to get a MOT with no documents was also an ‘experience’. And then it failed MOT. Rear left brake caliper sticking. Bam, more money, less mighty.

For a while we were all good again and I treated it to a few nice trips to races.
Had it died on the way to a race, this obviously wouldn’t be great, but having to miss a race wasn’t really the end of the world. Nah, it would have to die on my way home for Summer, driving to the boat. This was much closer to the world ending. In fact, it kind of did. 48hrs have passed and I’m still where I should’ve been 48hrs ago. Time travel for dummies. Patented.

As I came to the Loughborough/M1 roundabout, about 100m after passing the spot where the battery died, the dial with the funny thermometer looking thing dropped to the bottom, and red lights started flashing. Mothertrucker. With my boat leaving in 2h 30 and a 2h 20 drive ahead, my options were severely limited. Nonetheless, I did a lap of the roundabout and pulled over to have a quick look under the bonnet. Nothing was missing, nothing was on fire, and nothing smelled; nothing was wrong. Simples.

Boat leaving in 2h 20. 2h 20 drive ahead. Sounding more like a Monty day out already. Nothing the Mighty Leon can’t handle, eh.

You’d never realise how busy the A50 outside Blythe Bridge is until you exit the roundabout and your car loses power. But at that point, it will hit you... certainly figuratively, and probably literally. Carrying about 30mph through the roundabout, so I’m not going to get very far on zero power. And there’s no hard shoulder or even grass verge. Faaaack. Fasten your seatbelts.

As I tried to put my foot through the clutch to keep rolling, with massive lorries thundering around me, it was only a matter of time before something came out of the roundabout and inserted itself in my rear end. Clench. But fortunately for me, and in an unfortunate anti-climax for you, an entrance came into sight and managed to roll halfway into it. With a bit of a push I was safe for the time being. Boat leaving in 1h 10, 1h drive, car not starting... Hmmm. Starting to look like a bit more than the Leon can handle.

Pull out the HTC fresh from the 1900’s, but it’s actually semi working today for a change: mild relief. Google > “What to do when your car breaks down”. Search results: contact your breakdown cover provider. The Mighty Leon has never broken down (you know, ignoring the above mishaps..), why would I have that? . “What to do when your car breaks down no breakdown cover” . Search results: you’re fecked; to summarize. A call to Dad just to confirm that we definitely had no breakdown cover... only Mum & Dad are on holidays in goodness knows where. Poland or something the last time I heard. No dial tone to Dad’s phone. Haha. Gooood.

The little HTC has lost about 25% battery in the excitement, not ideal. Hang in there bud. Google maps > “breakdown recovery”. Ok, somewhere 2.8miles away. Wait, where the fudge am I? More Google mapping. Other apps are available. A50, outside Blythe Bridge. “Hey mister, I’ve just broken down, any chance you could come out and take a look?”. “Busy.” ”We don’t do recovery.” “Maybe in a few hours.” “We only do commercial recovery.”, F-A-B. Somewhere 7 miles away could come out for £80. 7 miles. 15mins. Boat leaving in 50mins, 1hr drive.

Down and out.

Time for some breakfast.

A sensory evaluation of what lay under the bonnet revealed too much heat, too much smell, and after a bit more looking; the realisation that there was a container type thing with the same symbol as the dead dash gauge, lying empty, with a ‘MIN’ marking about halfway; nothing more than some gritty residue lying at the bottom. ‘G12 only’it said. Google > G12 = Coolant. Bugger, thought so.

Then Dad rang back. I went for it, “Soz to disturb your holiday, but bad news..”.

Google > Where to buy G12 coolant. There was a Halfords 7 miles away. Always good to have a bike in the car when feceas meets fan. But stuck on a ridiculously busy dual carriageway, with lorries often coming past side by side in both lanes, I was somewhat apprehensive. Probably better to have breakdown cover.
More Google mapping showed if I went the opposite direction I could maybe get onto some back roads quite quickly. What other options did I have? Bike out of car and assembled, Garmin primed to record my fate.

Just about got crossed the carriageway, and got headed the other direction in search of some rideable roads. Coming into Blythe Bridge Dad rings again. Stopped in a filling station forecourt. He was talking to a mechanic back home and I don’t need any magic G12 jungle juice; she’ll run with water - but the coolant shouldn’t just have disappeared. Savage. Have 3L of water in the car, balls was I for buying any on the boat, will go back and throw that in and see what happens.

First up, 2L from an old milk bottle. Straight through, none of it staying in the reservoir. The mechanic did say it could take 5L, so maybe she just needs some more. 600ml water bottle. Straight through. Nah, this couldn’t be right. Indeed a closer look in the engine revealed it pissing right back out again. Boat sailed. Cute.

Updated father. What next? It looked like the balance had finally tipped in Mr ‘pick your car up for £80’s favour. Moneyyyyy.
But then I remembered that the fuel station forecourt I’d stopped in earlier had a sign for a MOT garage up on its side. Worth a try! 

“Hey mister, I’ve just broken down, any chance you could come out and take a look?”. After some more explaining I think he understood how non-existent my other options were and took pity. He didn’t have a recovery vehicle, but said he’d a van at home and he might be able to tow it in, but he’d brought the car into work today so would have to go home to get the van so it would take an hour or two. With the night’s boat not leaving to 22.30, I had time to spare...and well, no alternatives!

On Monday evening, in the last 10mins before the uni library closed, when I was supposed to be meeting Alice to pick up some stuff, amongst a million other ‘need to get out of the way before I go home tomorrow’ jobs, I’d nipped in and grabbed a few books. This proved a worthwhile excursion, because even after 6hrs of sitting around John Rice Motors, the less than mighty Leon was no closer to going anywhere. Evening boat wasn’t looing promising.

The water pump had died, blowing some seals in the engine cooling system, so all the coolant was back on Loughborough tarmac while the engine had been overheating the whole 90mins to her final resting place. Not good. Water pump and timing belt needing replaced, engine potentially damaged from overheating.
Moneyyyy.

Anyway, it wasn’t going to be finished within the day. So I headed home. The wrong home. Loughborough home. FFS. Fortunately there was a nearby train station, so was able to get back to Loughborough relatively handy. Made it through the door at 6.45. Exactly 12hrs after leaving. Should’ve arrived in me proper home in Banbridge at a similar time. Sat down to binge on ice-cream and watch Le Tour highlights to try and find some form of respite.

It was a rest day.

Hahaha. Buggers.

trying to get home. throwing money at trains

Day 2 involved more ice cream and waiting for the phone to ring to see if the water pump had cured it, or if the engine was screwed also. The call came and it seemed that the engine was ok. Which was good to say the least.

The morning boat left at 1030, so I guessed that I would just about be able to make it if I picked the car up at opening at 0900 the morning of Day 3. Then I remembered you have to be there an hour before sailing. Balllls. Rang John to see if the car would be ready to get Day 2 evening boat(+£70!). But it turned out he got to work at 0730 and opened at 0800. Hero!

It couldn’t be that easy though. There were no trains over before 0920.

4am alarm. 4.30am depart upon my one remaining bicycle, the mtb (gathered the willpower to go and do some intervals last night on the road bike. Then at 135rpm, 43mph, in bottom sprocket, chain jumps into frame and rips mech & hanger off. Nice. Much luck), 55miles out to the garage to pick up the car at 7.30-8am and try and make the 9.30 am boat.

Arrived at 9.45 after crazy traffic. Got a bit of a scolding but they let me on. 

And here I am +2300 words -£500 odd quid.
Fingers crossed we get the Leon off the boat in the Belfast air.

Off to stretch my legs but a report of British XC Rd 5 at Sherwood pines Sunday past may be on its way before the boat docks.

Next up is National Champs in Killarney on Sunday. Moar travel! Had a real solid race last weekend though so it should go well! (if I make it!)

Monty, out

(sitrep: made it to Killarney. Yeo! Only getting this posted now. Had all of 11hrs in my house before having to get on the road again!)

Irish XC NPS 1 - Slade Valley, Saggart, Dublin

Home from uni for Easter for pretty much all of April. Deadly!

Week/weekend plans:
Race. Train. Race. Train. Race. Train. Race. Recover. Smash BXC 2 at the start of May.
Really looking forward to some good time at home with real food and real mtb trails.

How it actually went:
Race first weekend, sustain injury during race. Can't ride for 2 weeks. Another week with only being able to ride every other day (letting the knee swelling go down again in-between), wondering if I could maybe still ride the 1st NPS before I went back to Loughborough. Missing my first stage race and multiple other deadly days bicycle riding. Absolute bummer.
Probably the 2 sunniest weeks of the year and I was stuck in the house. Thank me at any stage you wish.

So 3rd time back on the bike in 3 weeks: in Mary Peters on Thursday trying to get some race-pace MTB efforts done to test the old body out, seeing if I could chance NPS 1 on Sunday... all was going relatively well. Had planned 2 timed laps at the end, nailed the first one, was 6secs up 6mins into the second one... 23mph* off a fireroad into a little twisty bit of trail. Mary Peters is notorious for tight trees and trail furniture in dubious places, so I was being pretty cautious. Coming around a left hander with a tree on the apex, so running a little wide to the right, my front wheel clipped a log lying on the ground. Yes; after missing all the bloody trees and massive rocks I clip a bit of a dead tree lying randomly on the ground.

Straight over the bars. Perfect parabola. 23mph to 0 in less than a second using mostly my head. Flipping massive crash. Land a bit sideways on my head and my back twists and knocks all the wind out of me. HUUUHHH HUHHHH. You know those winded moans. Thought I'd done proper damage to my back (already in not so great condition if you remember back to BXC 1) so just lay there for a while wondering if I indeed was the biggest goober on the planet right now.
After some old lady had heard my moaning and came over to check up on me I finally got up off the ground to check the rest of the body and bike. Right knee also not great, big impact to quad, shin, shoulder fecked, big old gash in my seatpost and some rips in my grips.
Race prep: nailed it.



Friday came about. Couldn't really move my neck. Couldn't really move my back. Both knees now sore.
Saturday came about. Even less ROM in my neck. Back feeling a little better though. Feck it it'll all loosen up in the race..

At least the bike was in reasonable shape. It had already cost me enough this month! Cyclofudge buddy Luke Ireland of Belfast Bike Repair had been rebuilding my front wheel after the Ballykelly disaster and offered me a lift down to Slade Valley.

We got there in reasonable time and set out for a practice lap. I had a nice slick tyre on the front and semi slick on the back. It'd been sunny for the last month, I refused to believe the photos that IMBRC (race organisers) had put up the day before of lots of rain. Sure enough, it was in fact a bit wet. Masses of slippery roots upwards and downwards with wet dirt between. Sure enough, we had no tyre levers between us and the tyres weren't coming off without them. Ah sure it'll be grand.

Race was to start at 2 so about 1.45pm we headed up to the START/finish. I went for a quick portaloo visit, then chatted a while longer; waiting for the prize presentation for the earlier races to finish and our race to start. Or so I thought.
The prize presentation was coming to a close, and it was still pretty much only myself and Luke standing on the line. A little confused, I went for a look and spotted some people further down the fireroad... and as I got closer realised that it was everyone. All 160 odd entrants of the afternoon race lined up. Well, 160 - 2. Fudddge.

In rows of 3 that's about 53 rows. "Sorry. Can I get through. Sorry. Excuse me. Sorry. Can I squeeze past there. Sorry." for what seemed like an eternity before I finally found the rear end of S1. And about 10secs after I'd managed to squeeze in, Commissaire Martin Grimley told us we'd be starting in 30secs. Nice. #ontime

The race got off to a pretty hectic start. With Robin Seymour and Gareth Mckee, the two main men, on the front row, I had some serious ground to make and wanted to get it done quick. Every second counts when up against riders of that quality. Thankfully there was a decent bit of fireroad at the start and I was within reach of the top 5 before long after starting at the back of the massive 30+ man elite field. After a bit of a chuckle as I looked up and saw 2 time Olympian, >15 time Irish XC champion Seymour on me mate Barry Kellett's wheel, I was able to relax a bit and settle in. Mckee was away like a rocket but everyone else was riding quite steady.

After a bit of a mishap coming through the start/finish, I'd a bit of chasing to do again to get back to Seymour and Kellett. Onto Seymour's wheel, off the fireroad into some singletrack. Accidentally clipped out of my light weight not suitable for slippy conditions fudger pedals and couldn't for the life of me get clipped back in. Seymour = gone. Back out onto the fireroad, caught up to him again, but then ended up losing the pedal again and he was gone for good this time. Barry Kellett came past, and Graham Boyd wasn't far behind. At this stage my head was an absolute mess as I was about 2mins behind where I wanted to be. This led to some mental first class Fred moments, going straight on in corners when I must've had my eyes closed or something; completely off track and having to find my way back, sliding out on roots, more clipping out, realising how much my back wasn't 'loosening up'.

Matt Slattery came by, Graham came by, my head went by, I was left on my own in 6th re-evaluating life. Finally realised trying to go fast wasn't exactly working, so went for the 'just keep moving forward' alternative. At this stage I was just gonna be happy if I finished.

I ended up back with Graham, and stuck with him as he rode back to Matt and Barry. Although my back was completely fecked, knee was starting to get a bit sore, and arms were cramping from trying to pull brakes that weren't in the right place from earlier tumbles, Barry was making moves and I wasn't for letting him away when I'd made it this far!

Barry and I got away, and although we got stuck behind some pretty ignorant traffic in some of the singletrack, allowing Graham to catch us again, I was pretty sure the race for 3rd was going to be between us two.
On the penultimate climb Barry launched an attack. This was into the massively rooty 'rabbit ride' climb that I'd been struggling with all day on me slicks, and he got a bit of a gap, but back onto the fireroad, onto the last climb now, I came back alongside him. With only a big descent left to the finish, I made my move and got a gap into the descent, then attacked it to make some more ground. Then got stuck behind some S3 traffic, but thankfully like the majority of them, he politely allowed me through when he'd the chance, and fortunately Barry wasn't close enough behind to get through aswell.
Into the final couple of turns now and I could see Barry was a safe distance behind, so with some more S3s up ahead I wasn't going to get any further. Just stayed upright and made the finish.

As it turned out holeshot-Mckee was only 20secs ahead of me after all that! With Seymour just under 3mins away over the 1h 50min race. Decent enough day out after probably the worst 3 weeks 'training' possible.

Thanks to IMBRC for some brilliant work on the track. It didn't look much different from the 1st lap to the 5th after what, over 500 individual laps? Much appreciated by my slick tyres and questionable line choices.

After that it was back home for dinner and then to the overnight ferry to Liverpool and driving back to Loughborough.
An astoundingly crap Easter all in all, but excuses don't count, results do. Back to trying to get ontop of these injuries and save my season!

Thanks to Graham McIntyre for flawless bottle hand-ups!

Monty, out.

(Thanks to Sean Rowe and Action Pictures Ireland for the photos)

*strava official

UXC 2 - Ballykelly Forest

Coming into this race I was pretty worried about my back to say the least. Having to pull out of a race last weekend wasn't fun.

After upping my core training and almost a month of only riding the mtb, with some xc race simulation sessions, I had really thought that everything was a-ok and I was 'race ready'; back concerns hadn't even crossed my mind! Ideally I would've got at least one XC race done before the 1st British round, but with a lack of transport this proved impossible, so I did what I could and headed down to Essex with best intentions... and ended up in the back of an ambulance for about an hour after my race with crippling back pain. With one lap to go.

Everyone needs more purple skinsuit in their life, whether they know it or not.

Fast forward 6 days, a couple of trains, a plane and a country, I was on the start line of the Beggs & McGreevy Memorial road race in Dromore. I'd just picked up a Cervelo from Lakeland bikes earlier in the week, so had been focussed on getting it set up and ensuring it was 100% before my first road race of the season, not leaving me any time to try and figure out the cause of the back problems on the mtb. Fortunately all was grand on Saturday, back wasn't under much stress on the roady, and managed to sprint to 6th from an 80 man starting field. Was happy enough with that after some major tactical struggles in the race and pretty much towing everyone round the last lap while trying to get away #onemanband

Sunday morning 8am. Well. 8.06am to be specific; 'every second counts' as Lance said, my alarm went off and another day's push bike pedalling began. The second round of the Ulster XC series was being held at Ballykelly Forest, which I'd raced last year and was a brilliant course, so was super keen to do this year. Matt Adair was kind enough to give me a lift, and the Fiesta was lowered about 5 inches and on the road sometime around 9.

With a decent bit of water falling out of the sky this last few days, and more on Sunday morning as we drove up, things were pretty wet in practice. There's a steep old chute off a fireroad in Ballykelly, bit like the big dipper at Barry's #getherdipped.

Picture from last year - like I said it was pretty muddy this year. But after riding it multiple times in my race last year I thought it should be grand. Had a quick glance at it to make sure there were no surprises, and then dropped in. The bike was steering itself down it, and I had my head up, looking where I wanted to go; in control as much I could be given I was going down a massive muddy slide on 2 wheels. The bike started going a bit to the left, when I wanted to be a bit more right due to a bit of a hole and a tree; good line choice generally doesn't involve riding into these things. Nonetheless, I was still going in the general direction I intended, and the dip looked rideable if I missed the tree, and I was kind of running out of other options.

Into the dip and out of it on my face about 10ft down the track. Nice. WTF happened there?

Go back to fetch my bike and see this. Flat tyre ffs.

Walked back as many kids (and Barry Kellett) laughed and pointed. Them and their 16" bulletproof wheels. Buggers. Due to the Fiesta being pretty packed with our 2 bikes and kit, I hadn't taken spare wheels... and had forgotten my spoke key, of all days eh!

Massive thanks to Ciaran O'Hagan for the lend of his spare for the race. Hero!

Didn't get time to warm up, so some jumping around on the line had to do.

The start was epic. Albeit not in the traditional sense. With 5 laps to go, nobody was in that much of a rush,so myself and Matt Adair came to the front for a chat. Due to somemore crashes on the chute(which was the first bit of trail after the start fireroad), it was closed for the race, and we were sent down the B-line instead. After realising that neither of us had ridden the B-line in practice, we had a quick ask round to see if anyone else had; but no-one came forward. Adair went first and I followed... not quite as steep as the A line, but more twisty and technical, and still very wet. All was good until he went through 2 trees that my super wide bars were never going to manage, and being right on his tail there were no other lines left. I tried to slow down, but the tree got there first, and for the second time of the day I was getting a good Ballykelly soil sample. Straight over the bars, with a stem to the kneecap and bars to the groin. Probably should've been a gymnast.

Back up and going, turned out my front brake and shifter had twisted round so could no longer reach them; not ideal when trying to catch up to Matt again! A quick stop to knock them into place and relative composure was regained. As I noticed a decent slap of blood on my arm. ffs #notpro.

Caught up to Matt and we resumed our chat. Graham Boyd wasn't far behind us in 3rd, so coming into lap 2 I was keen to push on a bit. Not before falling off down the B-line again though. Re-caught Matt and then

attacked a little while later.

And that was that really. Got a good gap, rode steady and smooth; in the muddy conditions I just tried not to make any mistakes rather than go fast as such. Passed poor old Matt again on lap 4, as he'd punctured and was at the side of the trail. Knew at that stage that Graham wasn't close, and with Matt out I really just had to finish... with my cleat in my left shoe loosening itself from mid-lap 2, and my knee starting to seize up after my earlier crash, this wasn't quite as simple as it should've been. #360degreepedalengagement.

Super steep wet climb round the back of the course. Tried to hop off and run up it as I had done in previous laps. Foot just turned on pedal rather than unclipping. Cue standard slow motion clipless pedal rookie capsize. Lay in the mud for a while feeling sorry for myself and trying to get my foot out of the pedal. Finally got unclipped and half heartedly ran up the hill on my increasingly painful knee.

With about 1/2 lap to go I just focussed on trying to not let the cleat loosen too much more, or fall over, or have my knee explode, and eventually made it to the finishing straight, to freewheel down to the line to victory in my first Elite race. Not quite as I had planned, but nice to be fit enough to have it all go wrong and still win by 5mins. Train hard race easy or something :)

trying to look like this

nailed it*

Thanks to Graham McIntyre for doing my bottles. And to mother and father for feeding and watering me while I'm home for the month!

Would've liked to race on the road again this weekend in preparation for the 3 day stage race, Ras Mumhan over Easter weekend, but will probably have to let this knee and groin recover as they're not in great shape. 

Til then, (well, actually, til I get round to finishing off last week's 1st British XC round race report and uploading it)    

Monty :)

*sarcasm. lots of it.