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.