The journey from small guy to teenager...

[weeksy]

Today was a bit of a shit show. In more ways than one.

Practice went ok, but the track was horrific with crash after crash from riders. I think the boy had a small off, nothing major.
Runs started a little late, but we're used to that by now.

But then it went from bad to worse.
First rider off crashed on turn 1 and needed medics, so held up for ages.
Riders 2-3 went down but the timing equipment didn't register so needed to re-run.
Then out of 33 in youth, half (maybe more) didn't get times at all to their names with more timing issues.
We think the boy got a time but even by 3.15 we'd not seen any results. Screens were not working and no sheets up for his class.
They got called for run 2, but most didn't go up as conditions were worse and it was just too sketchy.
We were chatting to Scarlett his teammate and she crashed 6 times on run 1.
The boy got down his run without a crash, couple of days, but nothing major.

He was struggling though as felt he was slow and going to have a nightmare. With people like Hatton, Walker, Craik etc you can see why lol. But he got a run down and hopefully put a time in.

We'll see.

[Count Steer]

I think I'd be asking for the entry fee back!

[weeksy]

I think I'd be asking for the entry fee back!

That's a slightly complex one... i'm curious to see how things play out in terms of social media in the next few days. But if hypothetically we did that and pissed them off that much they could potentially not allow us to race their other events in future. Their events are always a couple of weeks before the National DH events and the only time you can practice/ride the tracks. He did get 10+ runs on the track he'll be racing, so in terms of value for money it's OK for a weekends riding. But in terms of for a planned and organised event... it was pretty poor. Not all of it was their fault of course.

The bit that pissed me off was "it's the first event of the season".... Yeah sure, i get that... but that also means you've had the last 4 months to test and check the timing equipment.

[weeksy]

This won't be the most exciting, but it'll give a bit of insight into things and what's now needed after a weekend. It may be boring for most so feel free to ignore... but for some setting out it may help.

The clean up begins.
3 x trousers
3 x jackets
2 x jerseys
5 x gloves
2 x goggles
1 x gazebo
2 x chairs
1 x power washer
2 x pair shoes

Things like the Gazebo need cleaning/drying... the chairs too. We don't want to put them all away wet and horrible.

The kit needs cleaning on the work-stand first to get the muddy mess off, then it'll get hand washed and then it'll go in the washing machine to finish it off.

The boy has cleaned his shoes, i've done most of the kit needed. The van will be this afternoon, hoover, wash floors and clean up seats etc... the seats are not too bad as we mostly had clean kit on for them, but the mud gets everyhwere as i'm sure most on here know. It'll all take a while later though that's for sure. But he's off school this week and nothing else to do today

Lessons from the weekend.
1. We need more gloves, 4 pairs isn't enough
2. We need more trousers, 2 pairs isn't enough
3. We need a table, just for putting helmets, gloves, coffee, food etc on.. We have one but i forgot it and it'll be mostly too small.
4. We need a spare front 29er x 20 wheel.
5. We need a 29er full on mud tyre. We only had a Magic Mary in soft compound for the front that was remotely suited to the conditions, the other fronts were arguably not as good.. Maybe something grippier would be nice.
6. AirBNB may be more expensive but i'm pretty sure we got a better nights kip than most of the adults who camped down the road. (However, we're likely to be camping on the 15th lol)
7. Keeping goggle clean can be impossible, even with multiple tear-offs fitted.

The lad struggled a bit over the weekend with "i'm too slow, everyone is fast" and i've still not quite worked out how to get into his head with this stuff and fix him on the day. I know he's quick, but it's all relative of course, he's not as quick as the quick boys in his Cat... but he's far from rubbish lol. I wasn't convinced at one stage he was going to go out for run 1. He was feeling that grumpy with it. But he got down it and certainly didn't look rubbish to me.

[Crosshair]

It’s tricky isn’t it.

What’s quite interesting about the boy and his pony stuff is that he loves his ponies like they’re his mates.
So it makes it really easy to transfer the expectation onto them instead. He doesn’t care one bit about *his* result (relative to the other kids/riders). As long as his pony “mates” did well and had fun and didn’t get injured then he’s happy.
Ie. he has an intrinsic motivation (the Pony’s improvement) Vrs an extrinsic one (their outright result together).

I guess it’s the only thing that seems concerning about the obsession with bike setup and having everything perfect at this stage in his career.
If you do all that and he’s *still* slower than the others then he’ll take it personally.
Whereas if he could get down in a similar time on a suboptimal setup then he’s still got room to feel proud about a relatively average result. And he’ll have likely had to ride ‘better’ than the winner on the “perfect” rig.

Applying what I have learned from Joe Friel’s book to this- I’d say there’d be great merit in creating an ATP (annual training plan) laid out on a calendar.

Start with 1 or 2 A races. Then space in maybe 3 B races and mark **every other race you do** as a C race.
(This doesn’t mean you don’t want to win every race you enter )
The great thing about this is it removes the pressure. The objective of a “C race” is practice! Practice nutrition. Practice bike setups. Practice pacing. Practice different line choices. Practice clothing choices. Practice warmup routines. Etc etc etc.
Results are just a bonus.

If your goal for a C race weekend is to “gain experience” then it makes it hard to fail.
If you goal is pinned to a stopwatch or a relative finishing position then it makes it hard to ever succeed. Hence saving that level of stress and pressure for A races

Not sure if this helps but just a few thoughts

I think you both deserve kudos for even staying there and racing once you saw the conditions- it looked horrendous

[weeksy]

I think you both deserve kudos for even staying there and racing once you saw the conditions- it looked horrendous

That sure was an interesting part and one that we had a few chats on and thoughts on.
We saw quite a number of kids crying yesterday, even as old as 16-17. Some was the conditions, some was crashing and some was people not wanting to go out. I was desperate to go over and call some father a wanker at one stage as he was going mental at his 16 year old daughter who came back after lunch and said "i'm not doing run 2" to him... "fucking waste of time" was one of the phrases.

I gave my lad a choice and pushed him on a bit, with "ok, lets go up to the start line, chat with a few who are coming down and see if it's better or worse than this morning".... He went up with his bike, fully kitted up and sort of ready to race... Had a chat with the commisare, a couple of riders and said "nah, not going to do run 2." i shrugged, we hugged and high fived and loaded up the van. There was honestly nothing to be gained from it.

We saw one of the Juvenile class who was 5s quickest after run1, he said "nah, not bothering" .... i get the impression he finished 3rd... which he'll be a bit disappointed in, but totally understandable. A couple of the superstars from the boys Youth class also bailed at the same time and it's just something we'll move ahead and learn from.

Start with 1 or 2 A races. Then space in maybe 3 B races and mark **every other race you do** as a C race.
(This doesn’t mean you don’t want to win every race you enter )
The great thing about this is it removes the pressure. The objective of a “C race” is practice! Practice nutrition. Practice bike setups. Practice pacing. Practice different line choices. Practice clothing choices. Practice warmup routines. Etc etc etc.
Results are just a bonus

The minor issue with this is that some of them by definition are more 'important' than the others. Not only are they ranked higher, e.g National, A, B, non-ranked, but they're also on much more harder courses (like yesterdays course), so you can say all you like it's not serious as it's a B... but he knows it is as it's a full national level track and the difficulty that brings.
We do still try to bring in a few lower ranked events as a playtime/messabout, but the schedule we have only allows so much of that.

I guess it’s the only thing that seems concerning about the obsession with bike setup and having everything perfect at this stage in his career.
If you do all that and he’s *still* slower than the others then he’ll take it personally.
Whereas if he could get down in a similar time on a suboptimal setup then he’s still got room to feel proud about a relatively average result. And he’ll have likely had to ride ‘better’ than the winner on the “perfect” rig.

Don't really get this one mate.. his bike is decent but it's far from the most decent bike out there.. but we have it set up as well as we can... but from there we've not touched it, it gets cleaned, sorted, checked, lubed... but that's about it. I don't think his choice of bike or not has any relation to how he feels about his performance/results. I could be wrong, but i'm pretty sure it's not the case.

[Crosshair]

Yeah the idea of ranking them isn’t anything to do with how hard it is or important they are in terms of difficulty or points. It’s purely to set your expectations. If anything, the harder courses are the perfect ones to go to with a C race mindset as there is way more scope for learning.
I hate the Americanisms usually but on the Trainerroad podcast they talk about approaching less important events ‘with curiosity’ and I think that describes a C race perfectly.

If you’re racing consecutive weekends for a while and treating them all equally- then the danger is that by the time an important race crops up, you’ve already ‘spent’ all of your adrenaline on the ones that don’t matter as much.

There must be a difference in the way you guys feel on the way to and from a training session with Katy than there is to and from a Race for example and that’s what the idea is to apply to C races. Then you can bottle up the *real* anticipation and excitement and adrenaline and unleash it in the one or two A races where it will make a difference


I guess with the kit, we’re only seeing your attention to detail which we should all be used to anyway and not jnr’s reaction to it

[weeksy]

Well i don't know if he's ecstatic or not.... but that's where we ended.

33 started the weekend... clearly a fair few didn't race due to whatever.

rheola by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[MingtheMerciless]

Michelin Wild Mud or whatever they’re calling it these days. Brilliant mud tyre
https://www.michelin.co.uk/bicycle/tyre ... mud-enduro

[weeksy]

2023-04-03_02-14-07 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[weeksy]

[weeksy]

quite tech he said

2023-04-04_07-58-22 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

2023-04-04_07-58-16 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[Mr Moofo]

That looks horrid.
Wasn't there a beer tent?

[weeksy]

That looks horrid.
Wasn't there a beer tent?

LOL i wish, but i had plenty of beer in the van so i was all good. Many events have beer though yes.

[weeksy]

Lunchtime fun today of stripping the race GT Fury down and replacing any bearings that need doing. I usually go a little excessive and replace in pairs, even if the 2nd of a pair feels OK...
Happily on the rear linkage most were pretty good, but one of the shock mount bearings was a bit stiff so they're replaced.

Then swapped the 10sp cassette to the Hope Pro4, but i may go 7sp on both so i have the spacer and a better chain line for the 25T and set the rear mech to allow only the 7 gears.

2023-04-04_11-59-34 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[weeksy]

Was spinning the bike up and checking the gears and the rear wheel was barely spinning, thought it was caliper alignment, but checked that and looked fine. Took it apart and the muddy slop seems to have killed the 6903 bearings at the weekend. One was a bit dodgy, the other is completely dead, moves about 0.1mm with fingers, just a wobble rather than the ability to rotate... so had to order a couple of those.

With those, the new pivot bearings, a new table for inside the gazebo and 2 new pair of TLD gloves, it's been a busy day on Ebay.

[weeksy]

[weeksy]

I had a day today booked with the coach. I have been finding that whilst I'm ok as a rider against 'normal' people, I'm not up to the pace of most of my Cat of racers. So wanting to improve, I got my big boys wallet out and booked the day. I had a blast, picked up lots of thoughts and techniques I now need to try to replicate in race in a few weeks time.

The boy jumped in on my session and was great to have him both showing me the correct way to do things, but also to have 1:1 time with the coach to run through ideas and skills. That's his 2nd session with Katy this week and both were laughing lots out there.

[MingtheMerciless]

Does she do RTTL OAP discount ?

....asking for a friend

[weeksy]

Does she do RTTL OAP discount ?

....asking for a friend

Not as far as I know. But she'd do groups if more than one of us wanted to book. I'd certainly do another one.