The journey from small guy to teenager...

[weeksy]

Just looking on Pinkbike and noticed the new Factory bikes for the World Champs this weekend are even running a bearing top end on their Vivid Coil shocks.



We're not in the price budget for a new Vivid, but it's interesting that they're running the bearing top end too.

[weeksy]

So this weekend was Pearce at Bucknell, Shropshire.

As you may (or may not) know by now, Pearce is a well regarded series and a step to Nationals for many racers, often you get people like Ethan and Jordan rocking up to race as they did it when younger and like to show support still.

The boys best result came a few month ago at Bringewood with a P11 beating his target of Top15 at Pearce for the year. We've always enjoyed the Pearce due to their organisation etc and relaxed attitude in the paddocks. We know a lot of the racers there, some slow, some fast, National Champs etc...

Saturday was a 5.30am start and we're getting up early and on our way, coffee and pain au chocolate and we're good to drive. Sadly with the A417 closed for weekend we had a longer and more twisty route.

He gets to practice from 9.30am till 4.15 (followed by a track walk ) so can get plenty of runs in. A couple of changes to the track irritated him a little but he was happy enough apart from that. He was riding most of the day with his new race/Morzine buddies and really enjoying it.

We sat and watched the World Champs, had a chill and then back out again... 

The day ended with a happy boy

As he went for track walk i got the fajjitas on and cooking.

IMG_20240831_185432 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

When the world is like this, racing is a bloody wonderful place to be. Eventually after some (too many?) beers it was bed... I was in the van and didn't sleep particularly well.

Sunday started overcast and low hanging clouds, but dry. After coffee, sausage baps and waking up slowly, the Session was prepped and he went out for practice, you get 2 hours or so on the Sunday. Weirdly after 3-4 runs he came in saying he wasn't massively feeling the track compared to yesterday. But that doesn't change anything, he's still got to get on and race it

He came down 3rd last off due to championship position of 3rd (currently anyway) and looked pretty smooth and fast in the run in... Going into P3. Sadly he dropped 2 places as the 2 ahead of him in the championship are obviously damn fast lol. So ended the day in P5 after run 1. Awesome and epic.

IMG-20240901-WA0001 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

(there'll be better pics/vids i promise)

He was happy, i was happy and his riding mate was ecstatic as he was P3 !!! HIs first time potentially on the podium

As we're waiting for race 2 the drops started from the sky, then more, then more. As it got more we decided to fit a more rain based tyre, which i don't think massively made any difference but the feeling was that in the grassy field it may offer more grip. 

Essentially speaking no-one (of note) went quicker on run 2 than on run 1 so he finished the day in P5. He was 4s slower on run 2, which considering the wet, we'll take that

A very happy day for us all

[Count Steer]

Nice work team.

Do the Pearce race positions (points?) count towards anything or are they a stand-alone, independent set of events?

What's up next?

[weeksy]

All event go towards an overall National DH championship..

https://www.britishcycling.org.uk/ranki ... perpage=40

Currently he's P16 in UK but that's without recent events added yet.

Pearce also have prizes etc for their overall titles so with their it's 8 races (4 days x 2 races) but all riders drop 1 race so 7 technically go to that.

Next is forest of Dean next weekend for a Regional race. But as always, it'll be hot competition with several from Nationals and Pearce etc in attendance.

[weeksy]

[weeksy]

The boy with his riding mate and rival. Just thought it was a cool pic as they've been riding a lot lately 

randr-photo-14391008-4792px-by-domphotography1 by steveweeks59, on Flickr

[Mr Moofo]

I think I could hear a squeaking noise from the rear shock ...

[weeksy]

Lol he's a daft boy ain't he. Lots of fun though.

[Mr Moofo]

Lol he's a daft boy ain't he. Lots of fun though.

Talented, wired differently - not necassarily daft

[weeksy]

Lol he's a daft boy ain't he. Lots of fun though.

Talented, wired differently - not necassarily daft

LOL i didn't mean it as an insult to him

The Ski-jump is absolutely massive, i'd say somewhere about 40' or more from take off to landing. The funny part was, after all the racing riding, intensity, what did he do on his day off yesterday... Yup, went riding.. 6 hours out with mates and then came back on an XC route trying to pick up a KOM on a sprint roadie segment. He managed 4th overall

Still enjoying himself though for sure... So all is good in the world.

[weeksy]

Onto the weekend and it's a bit of a play race for the boy. MIJ at the Forest of Dean, which is this week on Sheepskull, it's a track he knows pretty well and has raced (and won) on before. We've got some testing to do on the rear shock as we're throwing on the earlier standard shock for the weekend so i can see a bit of a comparison between both setups. We've also got some tyre testing to do but that's slightly dependant upon the weather in terms of Argotal/Kryptotal testing. 

I think we also need to start upping his pressures on the tyres a little. At the weekend he was running 18F 20R and when doing the Ski Jump you can see the tyres are basically flat on compression, so thinking maybe we need to throw a couple more in there in line with 21F 23R that we normally run at places like Dyfi and Fort William. 

Now is a good time to be testing these sorts of things out, so we'll be giving it a little bit of a testing over Sat and Sun. 

[weeksy]

IMG-20240905-WA0005 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

IMG-20240905-WA0004 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[ChrisW]

They did well not to go pop. Do you run tubeless for DH or inserts or...what?

[weeksy]

Tubeless, Continental Argotal. No inserts 19F 20R.

He probably did that 15+ times over weekend

But I do think we need to start adding a couple of psi

[weeksy]

Another long weekend of riding racing and stuff, started with a wedding on Fri and then straight to FoD for practice/riding. I was out with mates playing as the boy was doing some riding and testing of the race track. Admittedly he knows it well so should have gone well enough anyway. But they had taped a few lines slightly differently, but not necessarily lines he'd take as they were taped a bit easier than the faster lines.

We decided to come home on Sat night instead of staying over, which looking back was the correct move as it walloped down with rain lots so would have been a crappy nights sleep.
Rocking up on Sunday we parked next to some mates, but these days half the paddock are mates anyway. The boy was offered some uplifts from a mate who's bike i fixed a couple of races ago as a thank you for that So of course he took him up on it.
The track top section suited an enduro bike as a bit pedally, but the bottom was maybe more DH bike... but as always, he was on the Trek Session, no debate no discussion there. I'd fitted the older shock with the bushing/spacer to test that for the weekend and it seemed to hold up OK, but in truth he wasn't bothered either way which shock he was running.

Waiting at the finish on run1, his mate Trowb was coming down a couple of riders before him and stuck it into P1 by a massive gap, as the boy came down i saw a rider directly in front of him and realised he'd caught the rider on his run (just after half way down) which held him up.. He stuck it in P3, but was 6s off Trowb due to the hold up... Eeeeek !
Sometimes in racing you can get a re-run if held up by a rider but chatting to Len the commisaire the answer was "no mate sorry", ah well.

What impressed me was that the boy took it really well and wasn't angry or disappointed, just shrugged and moved on

Run2 is then seeeded, so despite him being held up he was 3rd last down and we knew the kid in 4th place and whilst he's quicker than him, it's not 30s so should have been OK.

Run 2 seemed to go pretty OK according to him but slightly lacking in comittment in some way (don't really know why). Sadly for Trowb he was pushed into P2 by an enduro fast racer and weeksy08 finished in P3. Not exactly what he/we had hoped i guess but a podium, a weekend of getting some fun, some laughs and riding, no injuries and the bike that still worked. So far from a disaster.

IMG-20240909-WA0001 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[weeksy]

randr-photo-14479729-5472px-by-chilli-films by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[weeksy]

So the weekend brings us back to what appears to be a somewhat chilly National DH race at Rhyd-Y-Felin.

It's the final race of the Nationals for 2024 and a track the lad knows well. There's multiple layouts possible up there, but either way, he's ridden both a fair few times now. The weather looks like it's changed as it was showing wet all day Sunday and now has moved onto being dry until 5pm Sunday... but it does look a bit on the chilly side, certainly at night. 

There will be of course all of the fast lads there, but we're used to that now and he'll just get on it and ride as fast as he can  

Looking forward to it now as always... it's been a LONNNNNNNG season but in truth i'm struggling to think of anything apart from Rheola that we'd have done differently this year, it's surpassed all expectations and goals.

[weeksy]

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

[weeksy]

IMG_20240914_115309 by steveweeks59, on Flickr

[MrLongbeard]

I'm seriously surprised how may parts y'all get through / destroy.
I get you're hammering them at every opportunity, but they don't seem to be made / up for the task.