Ooooooft what a long weekend again !
Rhyd-Y-Felin (known as Bala) round of the National DH series.
We rocked up Friday afternoon after a bit of a detour via a Supermarket as i'd forgotten to bring the big bag of food i'd bought the day before LOL. However i had beer, so all wasn't terrible
He did a track walk and i got on with the fajitas
We then spent the evening talking crap, laughing and playing with fire
The paddock atmosphere was brilliant (as it was all weekend). He spent his evening with Trowb his recent riding and racing mate and a load of others, messing about on mini-bikes and being daft, happily no-one was seriously hurt
Saturday was dry but the morning was chilly, not as chilly as sleeping in the back of the Transit overnight though.. Brrrrr. Luckily i had the right layering on and i was OK. The track was slick in places and the boy had decided to run Argotal Argotal rather than going for something Kryptotal related. He went out for 3-4 practices and was happy with his riding, his pace and overall pretty up-beat. I'd lent our brand new Hydrotal to a riding mate but with the proviso that if it rains i wanted it back.
However we didn't quite get to that easily as on his next run the boy came down out of the field with something in his hand... How shocked was i to find it was his X01 crank !!! The non-drive side had completely killed itself and exploded (pics tomorrow), it was in bits, but even though he'd stacked it on the massive drop as they exploded he got lucky and wasn't hurt at all.
Panic stations for me as we don't have a spare set of cranks. I ran round the various pro-pits trying to beg, borrow, steal or buy some cranks. No-one had any at all. Well, until the last chance which was Madison Saracen and he had a set of 83mm Shimano Saint cranks with chain-ring and a new BB. After a brief discussion on price i was over at our van ripping his X01 off and the BB, then handing it to the Madison mechanic who fitted the Shimano Saint set for me. (i could have but he seemed excited to do them so i let him). We also found the ChainGuide (MRP) was damaged, but it was decent enough to last the weekend, so with the cranks fitted the boy was ready to go out.
Until that is, he span his front wheel, which the 220mm SRAM HS2 rotor had pringled in the crash and was useless. I wasn't going to fanny about straightening it there and then so whipped the other one off the spare wheel and within a few minutes it was all done and he was back out. He got one more run before his seeding/Qualifying run. The bike worked perfectly so he was good to go.
Seeding he had a decent and clean run and stuck it in 14th, considering his best National result is 13th, that was obviously pretty decent i felt. However, him, not so much "placing is OK but the gap to the front is terrible", i could kinda see his point but i was still happy with 14th.
It was then another track walk in the evening for him and the beers, banter and chat was in full flow.I had to take a break in the banter as someone needed a headset changing on their Session, i have(had) several sets in the van and it's an easy fix. Matey who borrowed our Hydrotal came over and he'd smashed his Chain Guide to bits, so after another chat with the Madison bloke, I spent the next 45 mins fitting that along with a new chain for him as he'd lost it just off the start gate. We know quite a lot of people in the paddock know who we can call friends, so even though a lot of the talk is bike related, it's a lot of fun. Eventually (i say eventually, it was only 10.20pm) everyone went to bed and it was back in the Transit for me.
Sunday brought dry conditions in the sky but still a moist track so the Argotals stayed on for the start. His runs seemed OK and whilst the bike was coming back fairly messy, well, we've seen worse. Then about 12 the rain started, only that light misty stuff but it was soon destroying the track making the field in particular exceptionally treacherous. Lots of riders lobbing it in the floor on the wet field. So we sat it out for 45 mins and waited as we wanted to leave it as close to race run time as possible to try and see how the conditions were.
As it rained more he asked for the Hydrotal so it was chucked on as well as fitting ANOTHER headset onto another Session for a mate (who ended up beating in race, whoops)
He got a last run in on the Hydrotal and declared it was better and staying on for the race. A bit of food and sent him up the hill.
It's hard to put into words the tension when you're waiting for them to come down the hill, you keep looking at the riders despite knowing yours isn't next somehow just in case it is.
Rhyd-Y-Felin doesn't have Voda signal so you can't watch the live timing to see the splits etc..
Eventually i see his jersey and he's looking smooth and fast and drops into P2 with 13 riders left.
Final position was 9th place, which is again his best Nation finish and a bloody incredible way to finish off 2024 National Series, there's still races (more on that later) but that's it for the BNDS. We were all absolutely chuffed with 9th
Rhyd by
Steve Weeks, on Flickr
IMG-20240915-WA0001 by
Steve Weeks, on Flickr
As always, there's a hell of a long way to go in this game but when you consider that last year he was regularly putting it in the mid 30s in Nationals, the improvement is there for all to see.
There's been an incredible amount of things going on in the background lately which really could have affected his mindset all weekend but he put everything aside and stuck in a top top performance.
We're now back home and sorting the bike and getting the list for tomorrow
2 x full set headset bearings to order
1 x Trek/MRP chainguide to order
2 x front wheel bearings on Bontrager to swap
1 x HS2 220mm rotor to order
1 x gazebo leg to order and replace
