Just a brief one…
National XC Round 2 at Newnham Park. Excellent. This location always manages to put on a great show, the sun always shines, even after the “Great Storm” at Bontrager TwentyFour Twelve in 2012. Who remembers that? Martyn Salt and the environment agency were planning an evacuation at 02:00 hours (or something like like that !) It used to be the location for an XC World Cup round. With Round 2 of the National XC Series, Jay and Maddie Horton clearly put in a lot of time and effort into this event. Right now, I feel like I’ve come back from a holiday, it was such a good weekend.
My own race went well, finally I have some UCI points. Training wise I haven’t done much top end stuff yet, and today I couldn’t really go much faster but felt could I go on for ever (well almost). Roots and Rain website have finally tapped into the XC community, after a long history in Down Hill. Some really useful stats on there, I think my lap times were the second most consistent in the elite women, though I did start relatively slow! Also, I still have a couple of kilos to shift ( I’m 2 kg heavier than last year…) to be a competitive climber. Point being, I am happy where I am right now, work in progress continues…
Next stop Selkirk Marathon – 3000m of climbing. And please note (for my Training Camp buddies), its not on 6.7kg bike with smooth tarmac under tyre, riding along with 23 degrees of sunshine on your back.
Verity Appleyard 