The journey from small guy to teenager...

[weeksy]

[weeksy]

Once again i'm a bit tired and drained from the weekend. Pearce was a long day with a 6.30am start and by the time we'd headed for food at the pub it was 9.30pm home, but the bike was cleaned and the kit was ready.

We headed to FoD for the MIJ race. He knows the track, likes the track, so all was good. He did 6 runs of practice with 3 on the Privateer and 3 on the Trek Session. He decided the PRivateer was being used for run 1. The rain had been forecast and hadn't arrived, right until about 15 mins before the first class was due out, it started spitting . By the time my lad went out for his, 30 mins later it had turned into rain rain, but the track was holding up mostly fairly well. I went down to the bottom and this is where it went a little wrong as the rain turned from rain into RAIN !!!! He then decided the Trek may be the better choice but it was with me at the bottom and no phone signal meant he was racing the Privateer.
He stuck in a time of 1.10.300 which gave him 5th place... We were slightly surprised with the lad in 1st who'd put in a 1.06 or 1.07 and normally isn't that quick.... (however we found out he'd been sent out to check the timing when dry and got his run in... Not exactly sure i agree with that)... But the 1.10 and a 5th place was happy.
Lesson learned from last weekend and we stayed for the duration this time, by the time i got to the bottom it looked like this
IMG_20230917_153224 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

As we were waiting for run 2 a guy comes over, still don't know why i seem to be 'mechanic' in the pits but i was as usual. He'd snapped his 12sp chain on his Rocky Mountain E-bike, not a racer but just here with his mate and couldn't get home. Happily i had a 12sp link, well that and another 1 and a 10, 11, 8, LOL ... just to be safe. Well his Ebike had more idlers than i've EVER seen, it had 2 above the motor along with a tension from MRP on then bottom... Weird weird.... Wasn't too hard a fix, fiddle with the idlers, but sorted..
As i'm finishing that, another lad comes over and he'd broken his bike... "Give me 2 mins .."
He comes over with a Blue GT Fury Team !!!! Arrgghhhh. He'd been dropping his chain which was as always caused by the idler pulley, yup we know that one !!! Easiest way to get it freed was to remove the crank, it was a Shimano Saint with the usual Shimano system so 30s and it was free. But then looking at his chain alignment that needed sorting, so the idler setup was tweaked while the dad sat and chatted with Mrs Weeksy as the went to school in the same village.. Anyway, Job done... Oh... wait...
I had to then re-tension 12 of his spokes, 4 of them were finger tight and could moved SO much... But that was done in 5 mins, not a pro-job, but a "get down race run 2" type of job.

So i sends the boy out in the monsoony rain
Yup, proper wet for sure. The riders in front of him were not improving their time, mostly losing between 4-8s on race run 1.. Apart from 1 kid who went from a 1.10.0 to a 1.07 !!! Jeepers.

The lad came down with a 1.10.5 and retained 5th place.... Absolutely made up but a bit gutted he'd not been on the Trek in run 1. He was really really happy... Filthy and happy he'd put in a proper hard run.. I was suitably impressed.



We then had to clean up, sort, dry stuff and get back home... Another long long day.

Back home, washing the bikes, cleaning loads of kit and a bit of food.. the gazebo is drying, the sides are drying and i need a lie down

[weeksy]

randr-photo-11783834-6000px-by-reuben-roberts-photos by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[weeksy]

Now this really is something to aspire to

[weeksy]

So straight away we're onto next weekend now. Yeah i know... but it does come to a bit of an end soon. Or certainly at the very least a bit of a calming of the storm.

Antur Stiniog this weekend for National DH series. Obviously having missed Glencoe and Llangollen he's not put in quite the results he'd have liked in Nationals this season. But his form is good and he's riding nicely. The only main downside is that we've never been to Antur before, so it's all going to be very new to us.

Somewhat weirdly i get the impression that the non-pro-pit paddock is in a very different part to the pro-pit.

antur by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

But having never been i don't know exactly how these 2 locations relate to eachother.. or indeed how the parking will actually work. Due to times and distances i've booked a B&B for the Friday night for us, despite the costs being higher, if we drove up in the morning we'd have to get up at 4am which is somewhat silly... so we'll get a bit of food, a decent nights kip and suck up the costs.

We don't know (or really care as we've not been before) which course/track it's on. So he'll turn up, learn it in practice and see how he gets on None of the team are racing Nationals so it's just us. But we both know plenty of people in the paddock nowdays so we'll have people to chat to for sure. I'm still debating what we do regarding camping overnight as the 'camping' field seems to be 1.1miles away and i don't know how we'll manage parking if we head off from our location from Sat... plus there's the weather, which is looking typically north welsh and wet... It's possible we'll end up in the same B&B overnight as we are in on the Friday lol.

We're still learning, still making mistakes, still picking up knowledge of racing, riding, tracks.. I'm really hoping that next year which is year2 of Youth all of this will come into play and we start paying dividends as we arrive at tracks knowing a bit more than this year.

The boy still seems to be enjoying the racing and we have a fair few deep and meaningfuls about where, what, how and he tells me he still wants to race more and more... So that's how we're playing it.

I'm starting to find a bit of a happy place for myself too with racing/riding, i have been missing out a fair bit due to not being able to ride the tracks he's racing, so i've been doing more outside of race weekends, but also learning what and where i can do a bit when he's out playing too.

Part of me is looking forward to a break in the racing, part of me will be climbing the walls all weekend looking for something to do

[weeksy]

IMG-20230918-WA0002 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

IMG-20230918-WA0003 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

IMG-20230918-WA0001 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[weeksy]

https://m.facebook.com/britishcyclingnationaldownhill

Track preview for the weekend.

[weeksy]

I've removed the Hillbilly for the weekend on wheel #3, didn't see much point in a mud tyre for Antur. so that's now a DHR on there. Had a brand new one if you recall from a kind STW member a few months back.

Still not really sure how the logistics will work this weekend with parking/pitting due to space and areas, but we'll work something out i'm sure. It could well mean i'm kipping in the front of the Transit though, which will be a somewhat challenging nights sleep potentially.

Weather looks dry for Sat, but monsoony for Sunday.. But we'll make the best of it and just get on with things. Still debating whether to take the BBQ etc and do our own catering as usual, but in truth for me and the boy it's arguably more hassle than it's worth so i rekon we'll just use the cafe facilities this weekend.

It's the last National DH race of the year, so we're looking forward to it, but the lack of track knowledge will play a small factor in things, but there's only so many places you can visit and Antur is a LONG way from home to be heading up to on a weekend. The good news is, we got the entry for Hopton @ Pearce the weekend after We were on the waiting list due to logistical errors, but we're now paid up and in for that, which is brilliant as he knows the track a lot better than many he'll race

[weeksy]

IMG_20230923_074147 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

IMG_20230923_074136 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

IMG_20230923_085925 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[weeksy]

He's done 4 runs of practice and as is usual for him he's feeling slow. But we're used to that with him.

Seeding has been moved to today which may end up being his race time with the incoming weather

[weeksy]

48/61. Clean enough run. I think lack of track knowledge is a massive thing here, was 15s quicker than this morning. As we know, it's a tough gig in this Cat. So not exactly ecstatic but not too unhappy. We fight another day. Or, well, maybe not. Massive wind and rain due tomorrow which could easily mean tomorrow doesn't happen.

[weeksy]

Race cancelled. Position taken from seeding

[weeksy]

[weeksy]

[weeksy]

https://www.rootsandrain.com/photos/118 ... der/111960

I'm sure he'll be going shopping later.

[weeksy]

IMG-20230923-WA0008 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr


Pic taken by a mate.

[crust]

The boy's got a screw loose.

There's some seriously mental pictures in there. He's getting airtime down the steep bits loopy

[Count Steer]

Excellent. You don't have to pedal on those bits.

[weeksy]

I certainly wouldn't, you can't pedal in an ambulance.


Despite the finish position it was interesting to analyse his performance. He finished 16% from his Cat winner, which is actually the closest in a National he's been. So in some ways it was his strongest finish, even if the position doesn't show it much.
Was also interesting that 2 lads he races often were a lot quicker than him this weekend, but had been to Antur 3 times in the last fortnight, including Thurs this week.

[weeksy]

Obviously it's Monday.... so it's picture time.

IMG-20230925-WA0037 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

IMG-20230925-WA0023 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

IMG-20230925-WA0018 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

IMG-20230925-WA0029 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr