Sunday was the 2nd winter N-Duro in Rotorua.
Training has been good and motivation is very high, my 4 week training blocks finish
on the N-Duro weekends so I’m always very tired in the days leading up but after
the last race success I was confident I could do it again.
On Friday when Ra and I were out marking the trails we came
across a man in a Gater (a 4 wheeled motor bike golf cart looking thing) jammed
between 2 trees halfway down G-Rock. The trail was a mess he had widened it and
ripped it up, the guy wanted to carry on down the track but we talked him out
of it and spent 2 and half hours lifting, pushing and pulling this bloody golf
cart back up the hill, we got him out the top of the track we were absolutely buggered.
The next morning I woke up with pains everywhere it felt like I had been in the
gym working out all day, Ra thought he had been in a fight.
Saturday Scott Green and I rode the inner core trails
marking them out, the last track was rosebank with the wet exit river crossing,
I thought I would try finding a fast line across for the race. I tried out
hucking off a small jump so I wouldn’t get wet, as I cleared the water landing
on the other side it was a lot softer than it looked… I ate it big time, over
the bars and face into the dirt/mud when I got up my handle bars were snapped
in half, feeling very lucky I rode my bike with a joy stick home (my brother
once did this, he broken collar bone and was knocked out for a long time). Off
to Bike Culture, Rob sorted me a set of bars off one of Mikes many bikes. Mike is
away doing a tour of Colorado so he will have new ones already when he returns.
Cheers Rob and Mike.
Sunday rolled on and I was amped up to keep up with the
young guys heading off the worlds in a few weeks, during the start as always
the junior boys went off like a bat out of hell, so I just sat on them, after 5
minutes they were dropping like flies and leaving gaps. Dirk was rolling off
the front with no way to get by the young fella’s I had to do some dodgy
passing where I could and soon as we hit road I got past the juniors and went
after Dirk. At the moment I’m climbing very well and closed the 25 second gap up
in a few minutes. Once we were together we battled it out swapping the lead
many times. Coming into the last few km’s I was on the front but really struggling,
Dirk tire buzzed me about 20 times and I was feeling the pressure, I managed to
come out of the river first and sprint my legs off, I didn’t know if he was on
my wheel but I gave everything and he didn’t come around me. I was stoked to
win again and stoked to give Dirk a good race.
Katie didn’t race instead helped out Ra with the rego and
went for her own small ride cheering us on.. While waiting for the shuttle. For
those of you who don’t know, Katie has been battling a serious back injury for
a few years it has worsened over the past few months, she is having surgery in
2 weeks time. She try get in an update in between work, assignments, a sneaky
trip to the snow and moving house. Otherwise we will keep everyone updated on
her recovery.
Cheers
Carl
