Seasons are a funny thing. Just like each hemisphere follows the same patter, but six months apart, for climatic and fashion changes – cyclists are seasonal too. More than the recreational cyclist who dusts off their bike in Spring – Mountain Bikers follow different seasons around the globe, depending on their focus and locality.
As November is about to move into December, it’s amazing seeing where different friends around the world are with their season.
Locally, PT Brock is partway into a massive build up for the Road and Time Trial National Championships in January. He’s doing long days in the saddle with a criterium at the end of it, heavy squats, sessions behind the scooter… the guy is motivated. When he decides whether he is a New Zealander or Australian, and therefore which Nationals he is competing in, he should do well.
Various club mates and Subaru-MarathonMTB.com Team mates find themselves at different points. It is fair to say that Graeme Arnott, Justin Morris and myself are still feeling some Crocodile Trophy hangover – not overly helped by the Briar’s Highland Fling. This is far removed from those who are racing Australia’s National Cross Country Series, which started last weekend in Perth. This Elite crew that make huge sacrifices to prepare themselves for the series, then traverse the country to compete in it, are off and flying. The pace of the Briar’s Highland Fling, a week before Round 1, showed how ready a lot of them were.
Abroad, my MarathonMTB.com Team mate and ABSA Cape Epic partner Will Hayter has opted to not hang the bike up and grow large this November. To say he was disappointed in his season may be the wrong choice of words. Having crashed out of the 2011 ABSA Cape Epic, his season was derailled early. Later on, sick team mates, stolen bikes, poor weather and overuse injuries made his season less than enthralling. So he’s going into winter full gas, ready to be firing when we meet up for the ABSA Cape Epic in March.
When you put them together like that, it doesn't seem like that much.
And so I question what I’m doing now. Hindsight is a glorious thing, and I think my season should have ended on the far side of the Chaschauna on August 27th. That day left mental scars that are only just healing. Full feeling returned to all my fingers in early October. Most races since then were pulled out of, or raced with apathy. Post Croc Trophy, I was quietly envious of Justin Morris’ ability to not touch his bike for the whole two weeks coming up to the Fling. I was hoping for a result, and two weeks of not touching the bike doesn’t usually do me any favours. It’s a constant question of when to take some time off, recover, and plan for the next season. I don’t think I have ever made the right choice – but it’s difficult when I haven’t had a real winter since living in the UK form 2008 into 2009. How do you set a racing season when you don’t follow the seasonal changes of the climate? If my life represented climatic seasons, my wardrobe would move from autumnal hues then straight back to bright spring colours. The dark bleakness of winter hasn’t existed for a while.
So here I am, sitting in Sydney at the end of a wet week, looking at what could make for an absolutely packed 2012 Calender. The unfortunate postponement of the SRAM Singletrack Mind race at Awaba on Sunday hasn’t left me too disappointed. The new date in December will be better suited. The physical and metaphorical clouds will have cleared, the trails dried, and it will be time to start the long road to the 2012 Kona Odyssey, James Williamson Memorial Enduro, ABSA Cape Epic and Roc Laissaigas. That should be a good early block before some Cote d’Azur park up time, as I dodge another impending winter, and meet up with mates for their build into summer.