The morning before:
Hello North sydney police station how can I help?
I'm james lamb and I want to report the theft of my bike.
Ok just hold the line.
Life goes upside down in a flash. I was absolutely crushed.
I've spent heaps of money on that bike most of which was money from turning 30 from the family, and being at uni I just can't even fund enough savings for a crankset.
By the afternoon I was offered a bike to race with by the super generous Alex, it took some convincing as I was just so deflated from the dramas.
Wayne drops by a bit later and gives me a lift back to the coast.
RACE DAY.
I kindly take possession of a carbon BMC 26inch (remember this when you read the result) duallie with conti tubeless tyres, and set to work on getting the shock and tyre pressure right. Under 30mins from the start I go for a pedal up the dirt road to see how it feels, with shopping cart handle bars I'm thinking a big washout will be on the cards today.
We roll down the hill to the start line, with cold legs and with more 'guns' on the front row then we had in the trenches at Gallipoli, I sneak into the second row, with Martins famous 15sec count down
All hell breaks loose and we launch into the uphill start, someone takes themselves out and about 10others are held up, I sneak up the left, but still way back in say 15-20th, into the single track another person wants to make love to the dirt and I have to track stand and ride the roughest shittest line I have ever chosen through here, but came out alive and picked up a few more spots, through jurassic and towards the drop off I'm genuinely scared for my life on this bike.. I'm right on the wheel of David ludennia riding for 'team bogan' I think, he's has dropped his front chain but gravity is feeding us into the drop off, not thinking of the complications of David's mechanicals at the roll up to the drop off he nearly comes to a complete stop, I veer left now trying to go around him on only my front wheel, but he gets down the drop ( max is behind me with a front row seat) in just enough time before it goes horribly wrong for me, i get on the right line to go down the drop off, and not over my bars.
David hits eject at the bottom to fix the chain, me and max smack it to the fire road, for quick chat about how the hell I saved it from a front endo at the top of the drop off.
Right I'm still alive lets settle into riding this race for 4hrs, pushing a 44t around was a tad different, the fire road climb was over pretty quick. Soooo, Odams is here, Ward and Shippard also, and I didn't even see cameron ivory, well chops are you going to be happy with 4th.? Lets make that our goal, definitely no worse.
It took a good two laps to get comfy on the bike before I felt ok with riding ourimbah how I know how to. Around the 4th lap, I'm doing the maths on the race, it's surely to be a 9lap race, so lets eat for 4.5hrs not for 4hrs of racing.
Amongst everything else nutrition for this race was very different, with no time to get the Torq nutrition I like, I opted for cadel evans gels from Coles, they went well with the BMC I was riding 4 is not enough so I loaded my bottle with my recovery carb/protein mix I use after gym sessions. At @250cal a bottle I never got hungry.
As many of you know lap 2 to lap 9 can all just merge into one within the mind, but there was one standout.
Hitting the timber berm at Campbell's gully got very interesting on one occasion with all sorts of commotion which resulted in a slower rider riding at the base and me railing high up on the timber berm to pass him, it was a day were jelly leg never beat me, but the small rock step up on the final climb did. I was forced to go up the rock step up on the climb before the dipper about 5 times as people were taking the line on the left its the perfect spot to pass, one guy had me laughing, as he screamed out the f***king brilliance of my effort to make his day. I'm sure it was like only lap 3, so the step up was pretty easy.
That's the brilliance inside so many mountain bike races, and the inner beauty of Enduro racing, it posses the opportunity to learn from other riders, at some stage in life on a mountain bike someone is going to smoke it past you and leaves you in awe of the sport and you leave wanting to have those skills, so you just keep coming back for more. Racing at Dargle farm is the best for the above experience so many people cheer you on, going up the final climb "freak" "come on you can do it" "your my hero" "holy shit that guys in the dog" are some of the lines I've heard, and you just can't give up with support like this now can you.
Hitting up lap 7 I get a time gap call from the 'Odams' camp, I leave transition with some extra fire power then I ponder who he was actually referring to..... Because I then caught stu Adams, as the time gap would be so much greater to Jon Odams. But who knows as A rider 30-60sec in front of you at ourimbah is out of sight, after the roller coaster I see anthony shippard in the distance.. With Kyle ward just in front.. I had to rub my eyes.. I couldn't believe it.. So I try not to close the gap to fast, as I thought they will just accelerate once I caught up.
We go Congo line into the graveyard, now I'm feeling pretty good, but will I feel good if this turns into 1hr of Xc pace to the finish of the race?
Anthony plays team tactics and slows right down to let
Kyle can slip away..it doesn't seem to work, so he lets me through, once on the wheel of Kyle he hands over his position with the words "you go through I'm done".
The look of death on his face explained alot. I enter transition/timing with crafty going ballistic as I started the lap in 4th and I'm now 2nd. I give it heaps on the way back onto course for lap number 8. I finish lap 8 at the 3hr 55min mark, so I pull up for chat with crafty. Odams is totally un catchable, Odams on 4hrs of single track is on another level, not knowing the time gap back to Kyle & Anthony, but in my mind I knew they wouldn't be rushing to do extra Kms. So I bid Bon voyage to crafty to make sure of my position and do my 9th lap. Now just don't take yourself out and you get 2nd place chops.
When you feel great on a bike there is now better track then ourimbah.
On the PODIUM!
So there we have it.. What a roller coaster two days!
Big thanks to
Rocky trail Entertainment http://www.rockytrailentertainment.com/
MAGELLAN. http://www.magellangps.com.au/
To alex for the bike.
And to charli who gave me a lift to the race.
I'm very lucky to have the support I get.
Chops still needs a race bike. So if you want your company represented by ME, please get in touch.
JUST CHOPS :)
My stolen bike^^^^^^^^
Xo group set now
Hope brakes red rotor on the front
Black rotor on the back.
PODIUM!
