How To Be Awesome ;-)

Just stole this off a friends twitter feed, I think it completely, and rather brilliantly, replies to all those people (you know who you are and we all know a few of them) that say;

"...but I can't enter a race, I'm not good enough and I will look stupid- won't I?"



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

3rd November - Hamsterley Uplifts, The Knee Smasher!

Buzzing off the fun I'd had in the last couple races I entered the Urban X remember the troops race, wharncliffe again, but decided I best get some practise in on the bike. i did a half day with the lovely Max at Endeavour Coaching (you can read my testimonial at http://endeavourcoaching.co.uk/testimonials/). He was great and had me doing some little drops and steep corners and jumps by the end of the day that I'd never have tried on my own beforehand.

Being greedy and wanting more DH bike experience i booked on uplifts at Descend Hamsterly, the day was going great but I'd ridden all the day previously and was absolutely  shattered. I did the easier tracks all day and at one point had to do a suicide dive out the way as Danny Hart flew past me - he apologised to me at the bottom bless him and we had a bit of a laugh and a joke about it; it must be amazing to be able to ride that well.... a girl can dream!

Was starting to feel really tired and was considering calling it a day but decided to squeeze in another run, don't know why but something happened coming down the rocks at dantes, think my front tyre slipped a bit... As i came off the bottom of them into the flat corner I went to brake but my horrid hope M4 back brake was dead so i think I panicked, pulled on the front, highsided it and next thing I knew I was sliding along the ground under my bike. Just as i thought I'd got away with it my foot hooked up in my frame, wrenched my foot backwards and I heard a loud snap and a pop and quite possibly the worst pain I've ever felt in my life so far :-( I knew I'd done my knee in, it was the same knee I'd broken earlier in January but this hurt way more so I knew it was naughty....

Some lovely lads were at the track side and they helped get me and my bike up to the cabin (so sorry for you boys that had to carry my lead weight ass up that hill) i felt so bad. Seeing how quiet I was Joe was really worried and him and Chris rang an ambulance for me. The rest is history but was in hospital for 10 days, had one operation and have a long rehab and more operations to come.  How ironic I'd just been talking to Tom at Broken Riders about working together on my 2014 race aspirations! Well, here I am now- I'm officially a broken rider, so I'm going to use this blog to summarise my rehab and with the help and support of my friends, sponsors and riding buddies I will be back racing in 2014. So watch this space and lets see what happens folks!

27th October 2013 'Urban X' - Mates Team Race, Wharncliffe Woods

All fired up from the buzz of my first race I managed to sneak my way into a team to ride my second one pretty soon after! Trev had organised a really cool little mates race down in Sheffield and had a rule that each team had to have at least one girl to be able to take part. Pretty sweet idea if you ask me as its often really intimidating for us girls to enter races and knowing there were going to be a few of us there made it all seem much more accessible.

I was standing in for an injured rider on team WFO, i did apologise in advance for my lack of skill and experience but the lads assured me just the fact they'd get to race was good enough for them so I decided to go ahead and do it. And am I soooo glad that I did! I went down the day before the race to the team WFO HQ - Daz's new shop in Eckington. Met some of the guys and got some new tyres  to try out plus the lads were ace and changed them for me, which was just as well as they were a bit of a struggle to say the least! After that I made my way over closer to the race location and found a spot to park up in the camper and kip overnight, man it was chilly!!!!

Had been a bit scared off the night before by messages saying the girls had been there practising and were finding it pretty tricky, but was too late to back out now so just had to go and give it a whirl so I headed over to Wharncliffe to meet the lads and we rode along to the bottom of the track and started the lung busting push up. I had time for a quick practise run and yep, I found it all pretty tough... a couple of sections I just didn't have time to get to grips with so just had to leave it to chance and do my best. Luckily the lads were really supportive and made light of it all, I'm sure they secretly wished I was amazing so they could win but they assured me it was all about the taking part so I did feel better about that bless 'em.

Was lovely up at the start with the girls, was actually really funny all of us jostling for who was the slowest and who should go last, makes a change from the lads jostling for pole position lol. Then it was time for my first run down, rolled down the start ramp in and bang, stuck on the first rocks- they were quite tricky and weaved in between slippery roots, a few had already come a cropper here and so i decided they were beyond my capabilities and did a special cyclocross manoeuvre deciding to push my bike through them at a jog hahah. Then i hopped back on to finish the rest of the course- most of which i could actually ride (OK couple of tricky bits I had to get off for but hey)- as you can see in the photo I was literally just back on the bike... well half and  half anyway hahah, but still smiling and laughing :-) Thanks to Dave Clarkson for the fab photo, well timed and captured my spirit for the day I think :-) Shame he didn't get a snap from behind to show where I'd split my shorts falling on a rock- much to Trev's amusement ;-)

Our team did great considering I was in it. The boys put in some amazing times, Chris and Andy were on fire and Mike and Nick too even after some sketchy moments! And when the split times came out i wasn't the slowest so I'd already improved from my last outing. To add to that I think I'd managed to bring a smile to Trev's stressed face and met some amazing new friends and riding buddies. The Sheffield crew are second to none and it was an absolute pleasure, especially meeting the lovely Lorna- my fellow 'Pink Bike Princess' who made that horrible push-up bearable as I had an ace natter buddy and the nicest lads in DH history on the WFO team, ee its making me feel quite teary just writing this now hahahaha.

Can't wait to be back down there and do some more riding with these guys :-)

13th October 2013: My First DH Race - NDH Northern Champs, Kidland

So my first downhill race... actually one of the first times I'd even ridden proper downhill... Could count on both hands with fingers to spare how many times I'd ridden DH but as the race was in a lovely location up in North Northumberland I just had to have a go. What's the worst that can happen, right????

So I'd marshalled a couple times for Carl and his Northern Downhill events and always thought, hell yeah I could have a go at that- so having grabbed a lovely bike off Hannah back in July and had a couple days uplifts at Innerleithen and Hamsterly Forest I thought I'd throw myself in at the deep end and enter the NDH Northern Champs race at Kidland. I know the area really well and had ambled round on my XC bike with the dog plenty as I have family that live there so i figured I'd feel at home and if anything happened at least I'd have relatives close by to come scrape me off the floor ;-)

I was petrified on the day (yes even i get scared it's true) that I'd get in people's way and they'd all hate me being there, turns out there were only three of us girlies there too me, Janine and Rachel. I found out this is apparently as the NDH tracks are notoriously steep and twisty and can be pretty intimidating...oopsie!

Anyway, we got to the top of the track on the uplift bus and it was so foggy and misty I had to ditch the goggles in the bus and just go for it- my goodness it was carnage, so funny but literally all the way down I was slipping on roots, mud and tight corners, some sections seemed so steep to me I had to literally slide down them on my backside and hope the bike went with me (it did most of the time...).

I did both my race runs- the first was super scary as the masters lads were let loose right behind us so I had to get out the way of them as they were so fast it was like a herd of scary, wild animals were chasing me down. The second run was better as they waited til I got to the bottom, was great fun and although I found it hard and nearly took a marshall out when I launched my bike off the hillside its was great and the cheers and support of the marshalls, spectators and even Carl the organiser running along beside me at the bottom really helped me feel at ease. Anyway, I was so slow and rubbish and probably did more of  race on my arse than the bike but I laughed all the way down and had such a blast, I'd definitely got the bug.

Thanks to Yasmeen at 'The Hills Are Alive' for the photo, she has some skill that girl to have caught me at one of the rare moments I was actually on my bike :-)

So, overall I had a great day, met some top folk and set myself a target now to get into this and try get down some tracks without falling off a thousand times... I've a long way to go but I'll get there I'm sure, and a podium place & two medals - even if it was by default ;-)