Monkey Business

I see 4hr races an in between distance on the MTB, so went into Sunday's Brass Monkey race with a plan of just trying to stick to either of my two buddies making the trip over from Cardiff, Si Smith and Luke Morris with my target being "survival".

I had little panics when I went through the first, then the second and then the third lap in a top ten position!

Despite some really bad hamstring cramps on the short, sharp up hills of the Surrey course, I felt in a strangely good physical condition - even a little bit gutted when 04:00.00 clicked past on my Garmin with only a couple hundred more meters to getting another lap in!

Really, really happy with 6th in the seniors and had a lot of fun on the tight and technical course. And of course, this was my first MTB race on the Trek Superfly... That's a fast machine.

More training this week then a trip up to Brecon for the Welsh CX Champs on Sunday which is really exciting me!!

Wow it's 8pm...

... And I'm all fed and watered, my washing pile is relatively small and my bike has even has a mini strip down and clean after the weekends muddy antics over in Port Talbot.

This is a rare spare 5mins so I'll keep my new blog page fresh with some ramblings from this bike filled life!

I'm taking a day off work tomorrow to go and get my new bike set up properly. Who knows, it might fit perfectly.. But I really doubt that! Hopefully I'll get some pics and some more info after that session.. I'm also looking forward to swinging some kettle bells tomorrow evening and then cooling off ready for the Brass Monkey's race on Sunday :-))

Welsh CX 8, Margam Parc

Back to an old favourite - Margam Parc for another cyclocross race. It's just down the road so I was even able to get a lie in for this one. I've been excited all week about this event as it was the first 'in anger' outing for my recently arrived Trek Superfly. I'm new to the world of 29ers but initial impressions are pretty amazing!

I've been really impressed with the Welsh Cycling Cyclocross events this year. There's a friendly atmoshpere and competitive racing. Along with great courses, they're onto a winner. I just wish I'd done a few more earlier on in the season.

I feel like I put in a good performance today: For various reasons I haven't quite been out on the new bike as much as I'd have liked and there was a back to back midweek beast-ing in Pontcanna Dojo with Tom Young in his Circuits and Kettle Bells classes. Back to the race, my Garmin never lies - 55 minutes averaging 184bpm is tough going but I'm sure there another top 10 result added to my scorecard.

Next week I'm travelling to Surrey for the first of the Brass Monkey races.. 4 hours is pushing my limits of endurance so I'm expecting to ache after that!