Merida 24

Well you would think after completing National 24 I wouldn't want to look at a bike for a while let alone another 24hr. I decided within a week of competing at nationals that I would give the Merida ago, i dont know whether this is a good idea or not. I am going into this race thinking of it as a training ride, its a good chance to get my eating plan down pat as well as some extra training in the dirt. I have no real expectations of myself but i would like to keep up with Chris and Mick as they are doing it as a pair.

I also need to say thank you to Duck. He sent me up a sweet set of Next carbon bars, i have never riden with carbon bars before so i cant wait to give it a go.

Whip them legs

Bozz

Thanks

Its time to say thanks to a couple of people that have helped me on my mission to be a 24hr rider. Apart from my sponsors these people help me a hell of a lot.

I want to say thanks to Crummy as he's the one that got me to do my first ever mountain bike race back in 05 and since then it has always been about pushing/beating each other no matter what race or ride, Crummy has achieved some great results and has always been a bench mark for me in the sport.


Chris AKA the Forehead and his wife Bubble i met at my first ever solo attempt at the Merida 08 and since then they have become great friends, Chris is one of my training partners [coach] in Brisbane and always gives me a run for my money. Sometimes I think Chris is more excited about going to the Worlds then me.


Kiri my wife and my two girls Charlotte and Kaitlin are great. Kiri has supported me from the word go, I think she gets sick of me talking about bikes though! Both girls are also shaping up to be good little riders!


Last but by far not the least, Pearso [Slingshot], who has been looking after me at races from my very first race. He has driven with me to Canberra both times i have gone. He has been there crewing for me no matter what the weather conditions or where the race is. He is head pit crew and seems to enjoy watching me thrash myself in a 24hr (payback for all the riding I make him do!). Thank you very much Pearso for all your help.

Thanks

Now smash it

National Report

It all started for me last Thursday when Slingshot & I started the long drive down to Canberra. By 7am Friday morning we had arrived in Canberra, & while setting up we noticed fully sick Mick had rocked up. I managed to get out and do some practice laps with Slingshot, Sick Mick, Duck and Graham. The track was great and went down as the best 24hr track i have ridden. It was mostly single track, with a couple of small fire road sections. The single track itself had heaps of tree roots and pine needles which in the dry made the track a little slippery. Anyway, on race day i woke up and to be honest, after all the driving, i wasn't really fussed about doing the race. By the time 12pm came around i was in the mood and ready to go!

The start line had all the big names there: English, Fenner, Fellows, Claxton, Sick Mick and Crummy. As usual, the start of the race was flat out with all the big names gone. I took off with a bit of pace and then tried to get into a rhythm which worked out well. By the 4 hr mark i had taken third place in my category and was in the mix for a top 10 finish, but with 20hrs to go anything could happen. I pulled into pits at about 5pm to put lights on and some warm clothes...... little did i know that the rain was about to unleash. On the next lap I picked up my jacket and got on with the job. By this stage my lap times started to suffer but i was still on my XTC and the harness of the hardtail was setting in, the course was pretty wet but it was not raining anymore. By 12am my XTC had no brake pad left on it and it was time to get on the Anthem for some relief.

By morning and after having a couple of small issues [ falling asleep ] i was pretty stoked to hear that i was two laps clear of 4th place but my lap times left a little to be desired. Slingshot and Duck said the guy in 4th was hammering some laps and if i didn't pick up my game my 2 lap lead would pretty much be gone. With this in mind i managed to go out and pull my lap times back down by about 10mins which was a good feeling after sitting on a bike for 18hrs. Pretty much the rest of the race i had my crew cheering me on where they could, and i just kept myself going until 12. By the end of the race I was told I had finished 3rd in my category to Andy Fellow and English, and with an outright finish of 8th I had achieved my goals for the National race. Fully sick Mick won his category and finished 11th overall with crummy finishing 6th in his category and 21st overall after suffering bike troubles. Standing on the podium with some of the machines around you is a great feeling.

I want to thank Duck and Sling shot for helping me, i couldn't have done it without you guys!

& my wonderful wife Kiri for all the telepathic support she sent me.

Check out crummys blog for his race report

http://www.mcrummy.blogspot.com/

Smash it

National Solo

Here is some photos from the National solo last weekend, slingshot, duck crummy, Go sick Mick and myself. Duck and Slingshot crewed for me and did a great job i might add. on the results seen English 1st outright and Fellows 3rd outright, Sick Mick got 1st in the 40-44 age category and finished 11th outright my mate Crummy finished a impressive 21st outright after some some troubles with his bike and i finished 8th outright with a 3rd in my age group 25-29 i was happy coming 3rd considering English and Fellows were the ones that beat me.

Full report to follow

Smash it

Bozza

The Face,the Forehead and the Window licker

This was the name of our three man team that enter the geocentric 6hr held on at a property at Kurwongbah. Our team was made up of myself Chris[ The Forehead] and Pearso[ The Face] and you can work out who the window licker was. Chris manage to put us in first place right from the first lap with a 19:09 min lap so for the rest of the race all we needed to do was maintain the lead, i headed out for my lap and put in a solid time, pearso was then out for our third lap and literally smashed himself [27:48] he came in pretty smoked but recovered well to continue putting in solid time for the remainder of the race. The course itself had a bit of everthing in it hills, single track and fire road, but the challendging part was the mud. With the amount of recent rain the track was soaked with two sections pretty much unriderable, dispite this we all had a ball and the 1st place was the first time any of us have got a 1st in MTB racing. I will say thanks to everyone involved in the race it was great and to our support team[ wombat inc.] thanks alot.

Bozza