SI Cup Round 3 - Christchurch 19-20/02/11

This track in my opinion was a pretty basic track really. The majority of it was on grass paddocks. The top of the track was a little tech and had a few drops. That was good until you got to the massive pedal bit, which was pretty hard to pedal as there were rocks sticking out of the ground which would be so easy for you to catch a pedal on. After that it was into the grass paddocks. the first bit was tech as it was off camber through some rocks for quite a bit. Then in was into the sweeping turns on the grass which lead into a forest section which was pretty fun and the entry into it was pretty hard to get fast. After the forest section it was into the paddocks again to the finish where you go through a little spread out rock garden.

Saturday was the day i flew down, it was also the day of practice. I woke up at 5am to get ready for my flight to Christchurch. Everything went smoothly apart from the man at the check-in deciding he was going to be the first person to sting us with the $50 overweight fee. Landed in Christchurch, got our rental car and headed straight to the race. I went and registered while dad put my bike together for me. Straight after we were both done it was time to head to the shuttles. It was a long, slow windy drive to the top. Made even slower by the numerous amounts of roadies. 1st run down was slow to start as we had to wait up the top of the hill for the marshals to get in place. Once they were in place people started to head down. My first 3 or 4 runs were slow stopping and looking at the track runs as i had not done a track walk or anything. After those runs i started to do full runs and tried to go faster. A little after lunch me and Scott decided to stop up the top where the two drops were and watch people hit them and decide whether or not we wanted to hit them. While we were watching someone crashed coming into the first drop and collided with my bike which was off the side of the track in a hole in the bank. He hit it just right too snap my derailure hanger. Me and Scott took my chain off and tied the derailure to the frame with some flax leaves so it wouldnt end up in my rear wheel while i rode to the bottom. Found a marshal with tape so taped it up for the last little bit of the track and met dad at the car to go head to the bike shops to see if i could find a new hanger. Couldnt find a hanger anywhere. Snowy from Beckenham Cycles offered to lend me his bike (a Morewood Izimu) and all i had to do was use my brakes as he didnt have any on it. I ended up having to take him up on that offer.

Sunday was race day. I managed to get 2 practice runs down the track on Snowys bike. It was way too big for me, the supension was way too hard for me and the seat post was .way to long so i had a seat in the way the whole time while riding, but it was better than not riding at all so i wasnt about to complain. Both practice runs went good enough for me on a different bike. Seeding went good enough and so did race run. Wouldve been a lot faster on my own bike though. was a lot more careful and slower on the Morewood then i was on the TR450 as i was worried about getting bucked over the bars from the seat being too high especially through the rougher off cambre stuff. Ended up 2nd place about 9secs behind Sophie.

SI Cup Round 2 - Nelson - Fringe Hill - 11-12/02/11

This race was a Friday and Saturday race. I wasnt going to do this race till about a week before when Carl decided that he was keen to go down for it. He decided to go down as he was down for the week at mine because he was coming down for Nitro Circus on the Wednesday. We managed to organise the trip in two days and book everything as well as getting Lloyd and Mark to come along as well. We left Thursday morning, all meeting at the Ferry terminal to load up Carls car and swap bike racks so we can take all four bikes. The ferry over was pretty boring, we watched a movie for a bit, walked around and gernerally did nothing for the ride over. Once at Picton we drove to Nelson and tried to find the place we were staying at. (We had forgotten to write down the address or take a map with us, we only knew roughly where it was in relation to last weekends track. Probly took us about 30mins to find it.)

Friday was practice day. It was a hot, sunny and dry day like pretty much every other day for the previous races (expect rotorua of course). First run down the track, and i knew i liked this track, and suited me much better than last weekends one, and i figured i should be able to stand a decent chance at winning. I did enough runs to feel comfortable enough with the track. I could never

remember the track off by heart tho, but roughly knew what coming ahead of me as i rode the track. This track was a different sort of techniqual to last weekends. this track was more tight and rooty while still be fast. this has also got to be one of the only tracks where there werent actually any jumps on it really. there were a few kinda float over the top ones but that was cos how the hill went, not because the builders felt like chucking a jump in. I prefer these sort of tracks to the tracks with jumps on them just for the hell of it.

Saturday was race day. I did two runs down with Carl to steal his lines in one or two places, then it was time for seeding. Seeding went good enough. made a few small mistakes here and there like always, i was happy with my run though. Didnt pedal down the bottom as i was planning on saving my energy for race run. Race run came and went horribly. Right from the get go i stuffed up. got off line in the first corner causing me too lose heaps of speed. Crashed not long after that from being frustrated, then crashed again because i was too busy trying to work out where i could make up extra time instead of paying attention. After the second crash i fully concentrated on the track ahead of me and it all went good apart from losing the rear in a corner after a step

up jump and ended up crashing for 3rd time. After the third crash though, i stop caring and just let go of the brakes, scaring myself for pretty much the rest of the run. Got to the bottom of

track where the pedaly bit is feeling pretty knackered and frustrated. Pedal as hard as i could all the way down the last bit. That had to be the hardest and most pedaling ive done in ages if not

forever. I ended up with a 2nd place 3 seconds behind sophie and 4 seconds off my seeding time. I was pretty angry at that result, as if i had only had 2 crashes i would've won. Stupid crashes

Sunday was the day that we drove back to Picton to catch the ferry back to Wellington. we were on a 10.05 ferry in the moring which ment that we had to get about at about 5.30-6 in order to

have breakfast and stuff and repack the car and load all the bikes on and drive to Picton to be in time for our ferry. We all managed to be up on time to do what we had to do and pack the car. that is everyone but Mark, who we had to wake up in the end. We left pretty much on time maybe a couple mins late, not that it mattered as we gave ourselves more than enough time to get to the ferry. Played a racing car game in the ferry arcade for what ended up being roughly have the trip im guessing, then spent the rest of the time resting or walking around or whatever else you do on a ferry.

SI Cup Round 1 - Nelson - Kaka Hill - 5-6/02/11

So this race was a Saturday and Sunday race. Me and dad flew down Friday avro/evening and rented a car when we got there. The track was the same track that we raced on last year for the Nelson round of the cup and also the same track as the nat champs track of the previous year. Nothing had changed over the years.

Saturday was practice day, we got there nice and early and waited for rego to open, once rego was open i geared up and waited for shuttles to start. The shuttles were a bit slow and unorganised for the first few runs at least, then people started to get into the hang of how to load certain trailers and stuff. Just like the previous years, i liked the top and bottom, but not so much the middle section. The middle section isnt really my sort of track. It was wide and open and lose, and was fast and all over the place and hard to stop if you started to let go of the brakes, which i didnt like. I was struggling to keep on line for the middle section no matter what speed, so decided to keep to the nice and slower side of the speed so i was more likely to stay on my bike come race run.

Sunday was obviously Race day. I did a couple of practice runs making sure i could remember the majority of the track, which i could. Seeding run came and went, i was pretty happy with it. Sophie ended up beating me by over 20secs which i wasnt too impressed by. Race run came and i managed to go a little bit faster, still no where near sophies time though. I was happy with 2nd place to sophie. wasnt too keen on the 20sec gap though. but wasnt too worried, as she was the better rider on the day and obviously deserved the win.