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Monday morning, usual easy roller session behind me, breakfast inside me. It seems a good time to reflect on the week-end. More specifically on Hit The North, a 2h long MTB/CX hybrid race set at Phillips park on the outskirts of Manchester.

December 2010: Ha… The buzz from the 1st forays into cyclocross… 1h races in varying degrees of boggy/icy/snowy/slippery and sometimes even sunny conditions. 1h of fun. Oh, a 2 CX race? Why not? It’s bound to be twice as good. Entry form in.  

Friday evening (D-1): Family have been briefed. early rise at 7am. In the car by 8am. I pack the bike, and kit bag. Feeling a little anxious. The plan is to find race, race then venture out into Manchester for a bit of quality family time. 

Saturday (D-Day): family logistics went well with minimal stress. Jolly good. Off we go. A few wrong turns and we finally find Phillips park.(Don’t trust Google maps for Directions!). I pick up my race number, I meet John and David. The CX bikes are in the minority. Most of the competitors are on mountain bikes.

Time flies and next thing we know we start the race. 1st lap was all a bit of blur. Everybody around push a little harder. The setup is different from a CX race, no lap practice. That meant discovering the course. I apologise to those who got briefly stuck/impatient behind my wheels (I don’t think that impacted your overall placing). Verdict: a very technical course. Great mix of terrain. Bog, greavel, slabs, a ford, flowing descent (for most people), twisty trail, tight descents through the woods, a slog of a steep grassy bank, roots, bricks. Well done to @Mr_Terrahawk aka Jason for such a great course design.

Race comes and go. I fell off a significant number of times, ran, crawled and enjoy the gravelled/tarmac/single track sections the most as that’s the only places I could pick up riders. Looking forward to “upgrading” my skills in the coming months with a group session at Gisburn with Ed Oxley (aka GreatRock). 1h55 + 1 lap. 

Good to see familiar faces again (Alan Cook, Alan D, Dave H… etc… etc… ). 

I was sorry to hear that John had to pack early because of a mechanical. He was set to pull a great performance overing in the Top 20!

Many great photos can been seen online:

• SportSunday: http://www.sportsunday.co.uk/portfolio154298.html 
• Jo Allen: http://www.flickr.com/photos/hanglebads/sets/72157625912824487/
• Ed Rollason:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/ed_rollason/sets/72157626032449680/with/5438699739/

Results: http://www.hitthenorth.net/news/results/

Sunday (D+1): Ah. That’s how the legs feel the next day after running (without prior training runs I must add). Ouch :-)

Conclusion: Marvelous event. All being well, it shoudln’t be my last Hit The North. Thanks to Jason and his team for organising a special race. 

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Memories of a great course but a bad day on the bike from me :-)

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Thanks to  Gavin Hardwicke for posting this up on UK Cyclcross

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The Lune RCC Mafia, as Simon Wilson described it on the start line, was out in force on Saturday: Jack Pullar (Herbalife-Wheelbase), Ella Sadler-Andrews (Horizon Fitness), David Switzer and I. 

Excellent course. The roots caused me quite a lot of problems. I think every single root on the course interacted at one point or anotther with my tyres with some comic effect. 

I enjoyed the start. To my surprise, I ended up past the 1st corner at about 20th position. New sensation. Thankfully normal service resumed. My rolling mounts, which I thought were starting to click in training, completely deserted me during the race. So, I finished around mid table. A lot of room for improvement.

Oh and the famed cobbled climb was fab!

The results are now out: http://www.nwcca.org.uk/2010/11/east-liverpool-wheelers-cross-30-oct-2010-res…

I am not sure if any pictures from the race have been published on the interwebs. If you come across some, let me know :-)

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