Endura auckland series race 1 (woodhill)

Sunday morning dawned bright and clear. A refreshing change after a week of rain and miserable weather. A good omen.

After a long rugby season this felt like my first proper race in quite a while. Not strictly true because I had done the Jamis Day-Night Thriller the weekend before, but I wanted to make an impact and do well.

Arriving at Woodhill's old car park with the trailer laden down with Jafakids BBQ gear and the whole families bikes, conditions couldn't have been better - overcast but warm, tracks firm packed and in nice condition.After helping set up the Jafakids camp I had a chance to warm up with the rest of the Jafa crew including fellow R&R sponsered rider, Robin Page.

Race briefing saw a much larger crowd than I had been expecting, and a really nice positive atmosphere. The Auckland MTB Club crew had set the race around tracks I knew well, but quite a number of them would be ridden backwards.

Putting some serious effort into a sprint from the mass start up the forestry road saw me with a good lead into the first corner, but even at full pace some of the elite racers managed to slip past me before we hit the first single track. My ego-driven novice sprint start was giving me a good lesson in race prep and training - boy was I hurting!

The 12km lap, which I thought was going to be easy, turned out to be a real challenge. Corners I thought I knew well felt completely different at the pace we were all going, the hills felt longer and steeper, and the competition was intense.

By the end of the first lap I had dropped to ninth place in my category (under 17) and both my reputation and pride were on the line. Memo to self: training does matter.

The second 12km was just mind over matter - legs screaming, lungs burning and watery eyes. Boy, was I glad to cross the line! I had managed to hold ninth place and was really happy with that. Robin had done brilliantly well to secure 3rd place. The best thing was every single under 17 racer, male and female, was a Jafakid - well done crew.

All in all an awesome day and heaps of fun. Just need to do some serious training. Next stop Hunua.

     


  




  


 Thanks Barry Page and Jemma Manchester for the photos.