After Windham I flew home for two weeks to train and spend some time getting ready for the remaining three important races of the season. Time was well spent and I was thankful to get the chance to go home and recharge a little. back on the plane and two days later I’m in France. La Bresse is a venue that properly gets closer to Fort William for crowd and atmosphere. Track is dangerously short and fast in sections. Rain and some tire decisions to make. I don’t now why but I was struggling a little with my speed this weekend. Not sure why but I pushed through. Quali was solid but outside the top ten. I felt better coming into finals and after starting a little scrappy I rode better in the middle, still a bit messy but rode well to finish. 9th this weekend. I’m holding my position in the Top ten overall with one round to go. My goal at this point is to finish the year top ten in the standings. Top Team of the weekend in La Bresse, Trek World Racing is consistent!
Onward to Italy. Val Di Sole which means Valley of the Sun. It was spot on this year with that statement too. So what can I say about this place. It had the World Champs in 2008, I qualified at those worlds 3rd and finished 6th. Last year I got food poisoning for Quali and managed to hold together a top ten then crashed out on race day on my last practice run. I knocked myself out and spent my afternoon in the hospital not knowing where I was.
So I would say I’ve been up and down here in the past. What would happen this year? Well after walking the course with Aaron and Neko it was evident the rain had washed a lot of the dirt off the already rough, rooty and rocky course. Rough isn’t even a good description actually, most World Cups are rough this was beyond that. Some sections you could be skimming the roots with out even touching dirt. I was a little scared to race this one if it rained, ha!
First run down I decided to chill and check it out, I slipped on a rock a little faster than walking speed and got flipped over the bars. That was almost fine except there was a tree with a pad on it and I landed head first into it and felt my neck wrench into my chest. The noise was sicking, it sounded like I had been to a chiropractor. I sat down and waited until I could feel it settle down then I rolled the rest of the run and went to hospital to get an X ray. Four hours in the hospital and I was glad to be all clear, I had no cracks or breaks but some muscle damage and a stiff feeling neck.
I rested for the rest of the day and started to plan for how I would regather for the weekend. With Quali the next day and missing practice I decided I would ride my own pace and not try catch up, a track like this will only bite you, I learnt that lesson last year! So I put a clean solid run down and manged to come in 25th. I was actually happy with this run, it gave me confidence and I felt ready to start opening it up for the finals.
I needed to be solid for the finals to maintain a top Ten overall and I achieved that. I rode good up top, top ten split then I started to fade a little towards the finish with some sketchy moments. That type of course and I watched a lot of riders crash. 12th for the day which gave me 9th overall in the standings. I have to say, It might not be at podium finish but man I had to work hard this year and I appreciated this 9th more than any other year. I’m stoked!
So off to Chatel now and a week of chill before World Champs in Champery Switzerland. Whats my plan? I have three goals this year, have fun, ride fast and push myself. If I can achieve the first goal the other two will come. Cheers for the support!
