Updates - 18th May

Updates!

Been a while since the last post due to lots of travelling, racing, training and child illness!

Since the first round of the SRAM Liga in Viborg I have raced every weekend, plus several mid-week time trials also. All the racing, travelling and sick babies has been tough, so I have decided to take some rest.

In Summary:

25th/26th April saw us travelling up to Varberg for Varbergs MTB meeting. We drove up on the Saturday after a week of illness for Hilda, Malin, and eventually me. Although I think the pollen count also played a roll for me. Saturday was wet, cold and pretty miserable to say the least. We met up with Tobbe (Tobias Olsson) when we arrived and we went out on a practice lap. Wet, muddy and slidy fun! Course was tough, but good. Race day saw a front row start for me in elite, not sure why, which I squandered immediately by missing my pedal and ending up near the back by the start of the first climb. The weather was better, and the track had dried somewhat, but straight away I could feel I wasn't in the best form. I decided to push through and try to stay up with the leaders, if not in elite, then at least in H30! I rode in 5th position for 3 of the 5 laps before the fatigue set in and I started to lose pace. First being overtaken by the H30 eventual winner, and then a last lap battle for 5th place saw me finish 5s back in 6th.

29th April would be my first road Time Trial since around 2008! The Skåneallians races are held by various clubs in Skåne and are mainly time trials with some criterium road races thrown in, but all are held on workday evenings. I warmed up by cycling to the start in Södra Sandby, and was glad that I had. The 14:31 that is took to complete the 10km course felt like an eternity, and I struggled to find a good position or cadence on my standard road bike with no TT bars. Finishing in almost last position was all I could expect from a MTBers point of view arriving at a road time trial, but I enjoyed myself and the camaraderie was fantastic!

3rd May would be my XCup debut for 2015, having missed the first TT event due to a clash with SRAM Liga in Denmark. The course was pan flat, with lots of open fire-roads and no technical difficulties, so not exactly to my strengths. A reasonably strong start saw me sitting in the lead group with Johan, Roger and Per-Ola. Per-Ola and I started to lose the other two early on and so rode together for the majority of the race. Mainly with me pulling a small gap in the singletrack, which he then closed down on the open fire-roads. The battle went down to the line with me taking an early sprint on the last straight after the last singletrack. I knew if I had of waited for a real sprint he would have ripped my legs off, so I was pretty pleased when my tactic paid off and I rolled over the line in 3rd spot behind a flying Johan and Roger.

6th May was the next Allians TT. This time on a hilly 10km route in Söderåsen. 3km flat, 1,5km steep uphill, then onto the finish with rolling up and down terrain, but a mainly upwards trend, relatively steep up to the finish. Most said that a TT bike would still have the advantage, especially on the flat start and rolling middle sections. I warmed up nice and long again, knowing the climb would hurt. This time I found my TT legs, and hit a good steady cadence on the flat before hitting the climb. The climb was tough but I managed to maintain a good pace all the way up to the finish. A 6th place finish was my reward and I felt pretty pleased with that knowing I had beaten some of the lads with their expensive TT machines, aero helmets and skin-suits. I think the hill actually helped me more than the fact that I 'found' my TT legs. The pace however seemed to take it's toll, as I struggled to hold Robban's pace back to the car after the race. I was feeling pretty tired now.

10th May was round 2 of the SRAM Liga, and as with the other races leading up I had not planned a taper for this race. The fatigue was present already on Saturday. Pre-riding the course with Anton, he was pulling away from me on the climbs and I struggled to raise my HR at all. I was thinking already of not starting, but convinced myself that if I could get around then the points would be worth it. After the first lap of 7 I realised that this course was not one that you just take yourself around. I struggled to stay with people I know I can beat, and dropped time on every climb, long or short. After two laps I called it a day, and decided a week off the bike was now needed.

The week was only 3 days, as we had already planned to head up to Isaberg to ride some of the trails there and test the SM course, as well as have a mini-holiday in the caravan with some friends and their families. Come Thursday we were already riding, and the legs felt heavy to start with although after 30mins or so I started to feel better. The two days riding with friends was both fun and stress relieving. Saturday saw almost all of us driving up to the first Swe-Cup race of the year at Huskvarna Mountain. I even managed to convince a couple of marathon specialists to give XCO a try!

The course turned out to be pretty technical, and I felt a little guilty about convincing the others to come along. But it seemed like they enjoyed themselves anyway, and came away with some impressive results (and injuries....). My race was pretty good for the first and second lap, then the fatigue started to set in. I had a pretty good pace on the first lap, which held for the second. Then small mistakes crept in, and the hills started to hurt. 3rd place in H30 with a battle for second early on was still a pretty good result.

As for Sunday at Vårgårda, practice on the course showed that the legs were still tired from Saturday's efforts. I started from row 9, meaning a crowded start loop passing H30, H40, H50, and junior riders. I never caught the lead group on the start loop and instead put in a big effort on the first lap to get to within 100 metres of them. Unfortunately I never came closer than that, and then fell away with a laughable pace on laps 2, 3 and 4. I didn't feel so dead as the SRAM Liga race the week before, and managed to crawl into a fourth place. So some more rest should have me back on track for the rest of the season.