Monday 15th August (Drive to Val Di Sole)
We had to be out of the carpark we were staying in by 9am so we woke up at about 7am and had breakfast and tidied up. Once we had done that we went over to the bike wash and filled up our water tanks. Once we had done that, us kids headed down the roughly 20min dh track into the below town, while the dads emptied the waste waters and toilets. It was a cool track, with some random multiple lines in some places. And one section of it was like an axle deep dust bowl with just switchback straight after another switchback for a while. Once we had finished the track, we made our way to the gondala pick up where we were to meet our dads. We had to wait for them for a while. Once they eventually got there, me and Daniel headed up the gondala for another run, while Maddy decided to stay behind. The dads and Maddy went groccie shopping. Once again me and Daniel were at the campervans for a while waiting for them to come back from the groccie shopping. Once they got back, we put the groccies away, and hit the road for Val di Sole. Once we eventually got to Val di Sole (or somewhere where we knew was close to Val di Sole but we wernt sure where the racing was) we found a random side verge thingy and camped up for the night. We didnt camp till about 1030-11pm. Also we had dinner in a tuck stop place a few hours before so we just hit the sack as soon as we camped up.
Tuesday 16th August (Muck around and do a track walk)
We had a bit of a sleep today as we had nothing planned to do today. Around about lunch time we headed down to the bottom of the tracks, and met with the rest of team, and decided that we would do some riding this avro. But everyone wanted to do a track walk first, so we did that first. I didnt really see the point in wasting time doing a track walk today, when we would be able to do one tomorrow for free, but I went along with the others. First impression of the track was, that it was going to be bloody hard to do a run and stay on as well as tiring both physically and mentally. It was essentially just one big long rock garden for the whole length of the track, apart from a few fast bits and a few roots. Once we had finished the track walk, we headed up for some riding. Since us girls had finished quite a bit before the guys we went off on our own. We thought since there were two lifts that there would be a track or two coming down from the top of the 2nd one, but we were wrong. So we just rode down the road, then ended up god knows where, so pushed back up till we were under the gondola then free rode it down the grass among the rocks underneath until we got to where the bottom gondola meets the top one. Once there we got onto a random track and rode that to the bottom. When we finialy reached the bottom, the gondola had already done its last uplift, so we only got that one run, in which we wasted a lot of time going to the top and getting lost.
Wednesday 17th August (Track Walk)
Again since we couldnt register or anything till 2pm we slept in and just cruised and stuff till then. Once it reached 2pm I headed over to register. Once I had registered I waited for the others, then we all headed up as a group. The dads came up as well today. I started off with everyone, but they were spending way too long in the first couple of hundred meters for me to wait for them. So I went off on my own with dad following. I knew what lines that I wanted to hit, and stuff. It was just a matter of remembering where they were, and how to get onto them.
Thursday 18th August (Practice)
Today was the first day of practice. All I can say is that the track is bloody hard and the hardest bit of the track is in the first 200-300 meters of the track. There was a bridge about 1/4-1/3 of the way down. Once you got past there the track was easier and I could actually get down it. I only did about 6 runs today, which I wasnt too happy with. Stupid brakes wernt co-operating. By the end of the track I had both brakes on full and I wasnt exactly slowing down in any sort of hurry. Even at the start of the run they wouldnt lock up. Getting down was hard enough with out worrying about your brakes. I got Mildy to look at them, and he said something as def wrong with them. Took them to the SRAM dudes and they bleed the brakes for me, and had a look at them, but said nothing was wrong with them. The brakes were still the same when I got them back, except for the lever feeling like it had more power, but the brakes were still essentially powerless. When we got back to the campsite, I got Daniel to have a look at them for me. My pads were glazed so we scuffed them up, and then gave the disks a good clean with his brake cleaner. After that, they were locking up a little bit if you gave them a good grab once we had ridden up and down the road the few times. I now knew that was the best I was gonna get them.
Friday 19th August (Qualifying)
Since I didnt get any where near as many runs as I would have liked yesterday, I started cranking out the runs from the very start of practice. In the 3 hours I managed about 5-6 runs I think. My main focus was trying to ride the top bit of the track as I hadnt yet managed to get down it without crashing or stuffing up and having to come to a stop. Finaly I managed to get the top bit sorted on my last 2 or runs. I took note of exactly where I braked and where I changed direction etc etc as I knew this was the bit I was struggling the greatest. Seeing the other girls ride I was pretty certain I wouldnt qualify, but still gave it my best. I had a good enough run. I managed to stay on which was good, but slipped a few pedals and had to slow down quite a bit to sort out my feet. I ended up 27th which I wasnt the happiest with, especially since tehre were 3 juniors ahead of me and they all qualified. None of the Kiwi girls qualified unfortunetly. None of the non pros Kiwis qualified either apart from Ruben who got like 37th or something. Daniel also had 4x qualifying this evening and quailified 28th even tho he stuffed up a corner and cased the pro line jumps.
Saturday 20th August (drove to venice)
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