dundee and all that...

Life in the Trench

Sunday saw me riding my first cross race in Wiggle colours.

Although i had my belgians shirt on as well underneath for warming up !!!!

Dundee, famous for it's cake, cold weather and outside velodrome hosted the event. Over 100 people took place and battle was fierce. The velodrome, being tarmac, took centre stage with both start and finishing straights leading to some epic battles every lap.

It has, you may have noticed, been raining biblically over the past week and the ground was not going to let us forget it - despite a sun kissed departure of the gladiatorial throng. The mud was harrowingly sticky and deep - more suited to marine commando adverts than silth like honed athletes. By lap two all were well spread.

Having got caught out in the 'Tunnel of Mud' at the top end - bitten by a submerged root that had me doing the first bog snorkelling of the day - I then spent quite a time chasing the lead group and getting back on. In fact, by the time I had made contact the field was so spread out that lapping was taking place. Pushing on, pushing- sometimes literally, was the only solution and at times it was a lonely slurp of brown sticky goo that was my only companion sitting between me and the bid for victory.

It was never going to happen.

The boys at the front were storming and chasing was the order of the day.It is about training - we have bigger fish to fry - but it was good and it was testing and most of all it was great fun!

no news is supposed to be good news and indeed it is save for the disasteous let' s go ride the across on the mainland only to find that the weather has put a stop to calmacs 'not so much pleasure' boat.

so we ran coaching sessions ad races for local kids instead. even a senior coach from the glasgow eventually got across and had a great 24hrs too...in true islay fashion!

i have also been busy as part the nearly famous wiggle brothers

http://www.thewashingmachinepost.net/team_wiggle/

the training for which is keeping on the road and building solid miles.

not for long though for in a a couple of weeks i will be racing at dundee...yipee!

at the weekend

thanks to bazzargh for the film.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TpP8xpUODxQ

back again in two weeks

seen on a chainstay in portland

a cross mantra......

'trample the weak and hurdle the dead' thanks to bp at TWMP

bute cross

whilst most are already racing cross, here in scottishland we still have to wait. some are still training and some are just straining at the leash. last weekend the juniors had their first shot at racing on a neighbouring island. Bute is only 54 miles away as the tub flies but it is two ferry journeys (amounting to 3 hours on the sea away and 3 hours of driving!) we had thought of riding. unfortunately time was against us although my 10year old son has asked to do so next year. this will take an extra day each end and camping enroute. hopefully we will next year . we only took our cross bikes and Bute put on a terrific festival in a typical low key island way where eating scones and jam were as important as racing the serpentine hill.

we all joined in setting up the course. course building by democracy is an interesting experience! and was eventually achieved so that the kids could start on time. it was testing and fast at the same time. lots of kids entered with a big contingent from the johnstone jets gunning for the top places - sorry that the wee guy from islay stole your thunder!

the afternoon soon arrived with the invitation to race the two up. how could i refuse? i was trying to get a dads cross race but nobody would have it...damn! so i rode the two up - swapped my ss for a fixed cog (thank you phil wood) for kiss off hubs and donned my team shirt and off we went my steed was as unsuitable for a team trial as was my partner tom hunter from falkirk - who shall we say is generous in proportions and more suited to touring than anything else! the end note was that we were not last - by some measure!

in a couple of weeks the season starts for real - bring it on!

have you seen

this????

http://vimeo.com/5923730

just incase

...you did not know ;-0

http://www.britishcycling.org.uk/web/site/SCU/scu/sc_calendar.asp?evt_cp=1&evt_mode=0&evt_id=&evt_seriesid=&evt_myevents=No&RefID=&RefType=&evt_month=All&evt_kw=&evt_regions=Scotland&evt_disc=Cyclo-Cross&evt_class=&evt_cat=&evt_series=&evt_resultspp=20