After spending a number of months away riding and racing my mountain bike in some amazing locations, there are a variety of ways to view a return home. Some of it is relief, to not be living out of a suitcase (ok, backpack…). In part there is also disappointment that the journey is over. Not achieving some goals also stings a bit, and the return to work creates mixed emotions. But after mainly racing long distance, hard events in fields that massively out-class you, it’s a whole lot of fun to return home and enter some club races. In Sydney, I’m still massively out-classed in club level racing. But it’s local, low key and fun.
A weekend of high intensity club racing was a great way to blast the jet lag cobwebs out of the legs. A couple of ‘cross races on Saturday at Waratah Park were pure fun. Cyclocross is just moving out of sideshow status in Australia, in part due to the Dirty Deeds series in Melbourne. Thankfully the ingrained Melbourne vs Sydney rivalry has resulted in a big push from a committed crew to get the ball rolling in Sydney. The turnout was quality, with previous National Champions, Institute riders, and top riders from a variety of disciplines. Needless to say the pace was hot, with only one person needing medical attention.
Sunday brought more options, in the form of road racing and cross country mountain bike racing. At this point, I’m still keen to do something different to what the past few months have involved, so road racing won out. Plus this way there was no car driving involved. The course in the northern parkland of Sydney was a great location – a real reminder of why Sydney is a great place to live and be a cyclist. The bunch was small, seemingly made up of a whole local team. It seemed like the rest of us were part of their team time trial training on the rolling hills above ‘Summer Bay’. And then the pace lifted a few times and my race was over. My team mate Justin Maddog Morris hung tough, finishing well. It’s great to see how well he is going coming up to our participation in the Crocodile troiphy as Subaru/MarathonMTB.com.
And so I can end the weekend happy with how things played out. Three races, one DNF, and a whole lot of hurt. When doing higher level marathons, it’s easy for someone like myself to end up riding at my own pace in no mans land. Thankfully this weekend required more jumps up to other peoples speed, and that’s a challenge. Challenges are good as they make us improve. And that’s the mental refresher I’ve needed since the National Park Bike Marathon and the Kielder 100.
Roll on the summer!