For those of us who were doing the second round of the South Island XC Cup race in Timaru on Sunday, there was no choice. It was out and about in the heat and humidity, for two (or three) laps of a 13.5 km course.
I was one of the lucky ones to only have to do two laps. But still, two laps of 13.5km (closer to 14 on my speedo) in the intense heat was hard enough. The course was didn’t cover much elevation (from 10 m to 50 m above sea-level from memory), but had enough short, sharp pinch climbs put you in the hurt box for short periods of time.
Making full use of the long weekend, we headed up to Timaru on Friday morning, arrived just after lunch time, and set about pitching our brand new tent at the Top 10 Holiday Park. Samara and Lisa headed out for a ride of the course, while Scotty and I decided to hide out from the sun for a little bit longer and opted to head out for a later (4pm) pre-ride. We ran into Connor looking a bit lost at one of the mapboards in the Park, and together, we managed to find our way around the lap (with only a dozen or so diversions and stops to consult the tiny map on an A5 page we ripped out of the Nationals handbook).
The course was quite different to anything I’d ridden before. The crew at the Timaru MTB Club have done an awesome job of building a nice network of trails with a lot of variety – faster wide open sections, short steep chutes, nasty pinch climbs, gravel, rock, dust, roots, bridges, cattle-stops… it had a bit of everything! After my first pre-ride, I wasn’t particularly fond of the first half of the course, but loved the second half (a bit more flowy). But by the second sifty pre-ride on Saturday, I was enjoying the whole course a lot more. Bring on Sunday!
The news reports on Saturday which predicted a hot day for NZ (up to 40 degrees in some places) were spot on, and Sunday was super-hot and humid in Timaru (a predicted high of 33 degrees. I’m not sure how hot it actually was – sure felt a lot hotter in certain places on the course!). Being a partnered event with the X-Scenic, all the South Island Cup riders were racing in the afternoon. Having never started a race in the afternoon before, that threw my pre-race routine a little bit askew, but I think I managed OK.
The Senior Women’s field was looking a bit larger (4!) for the second race of the SI Cup – myself, Amy Laird (who kicked arse in the North Island Cup rounds), Sam Yeo (who was 20 minutes ahead of me last weekend in the first round), and international downhiller Sabrina Jonnier (awesome!). There were also a couple of U19 riders who were doing two laps of the course. A mass start for all the categories took place up the road a few hundred metres from the start (with the start gun catching us all by surprise as we were standing around chatting away!), and we were off.
Dry and dusty. That would describe the first sections of the course. With the mass start, very quickly we came to a bottleneck with the first pinch climb. Ah well.. off the bike for a quick push it was..
I’d already lost Amy off the start line, Sam and Sarah (one of the U19 girls) were a few places ahead of me, and Sabrina right on my tail. Saw one guy right ahead of me with too much speed into a bridge and crashing out on the trail just afterwards – after a quick “oh sh*t! are you OK?!” from me, I was off again trying to keep up with the pace. Across some more wide open stuff, a couple of short stream crossings (with pinch climbs up the other side), then onto a gradual gravel climb, I could hear Sabrina right behind me. Into some singletrack and she was right on my tail. The people in front of me was taking it pretty conservatively on the downhills so I was fairly happy sitting back and waiting to pass. Come the first open section and Sabrina came blasting past me. Uh oh. For the next wide open section (which went back past the feedzone – “Go Celia!!”), I put my bike in the big chain ring and sprinted as fast as I could to catch her. At some point I did and overtook her, and that provided my motivation to stay ahead throughout the race. On a tricky uphill pinch climb, I passed Sarah and was determined to stay ahead of her also.
More singletrack and I could see Sam a bit further ahead. Sweet – so I wasn’t too far behind. But I knew that Sabrina and Sarah weren’t too far behind me. Keep pedalling Celia! It got a lot hotter on the second half of the course – the heat almost came in waves in places. I’m not a big drinker, but I managed to finish my whole bottle on the first lap. At one point on the first lap, I dropped my bottle on the course while trying to put it back in the bottle holder (located in a rather awkward position on the underside of the downtube), stopped and ran a couple of metres back to pick it up. I REALLY needed the rest of the drink in that bottle! Coming into the feedzone, I could see Scotty helping Samara (who DNFed with heatstroke), and had to yell “Scotty!!” before he realised I was coming through and needed my second bottle.
I was in survival mode on the second lap. I rode better because there weren’t people getting off in front of me on the pinch climbs, and I only pushed one pinch climb (the sharpest longest one on course), but it was very, very hot out there which made me work quite hard. I finished my bottle halfway around the lap and was using the Leppin squeezy I had in my back pocket. I also felt like I was in a bit of a No-Mans-land for the first half or so of the second lap. After having riders so close ahead and behind on the first lap, it felt like I was riding by myself for the second one. Around halfway through the lap I could see people ahead of me so that was good. Surprisingly, I could also see Sam not too far ahead aswell. Cool! Let’s see how close I can get to her! In the last couple of km of the second lap, I passed a Masters Woman (who had to do three laps.. go figure) and an U18 rider in the XScenic event, and pedalled as hard as I could (which wasn’t particularly fast) to finish the race.
Overall, I’m pretty happy with how I went in the race. I came in third and was less than two minutes behind Sam in second place (who was 20 minutes ahead last weekend). Looking at the lap times, I was one of the few people who actually posted a faster second lap time than first lap time, so although I was suffering out there in the heat, I probably was doing better (relatively speaking) than others. Average HR: 189, Max HR: 198. Similar to Rotorua’s HR stats but it felt like I pushed myself harder than in Rotorua (mainly due to the heat yesterday). The legs felt good from quite early on in the race – stretching the day before, falling asleep on Saturday afternoon with my legs elevated (yup.. nana nap time..), and the warm-up I did beforehand must’ve helped!
Standing precariously on the make-shift podium made out of upside down plastic crates..
So this week is my final week of “training” with my final “serious” race of the season this weekend at Coronet Peak. I’m looking forward to the end of my season and to whatever other events/adventures/rides I do afterwards. I think the Ghost to Ghost Duathlon in St Bathans (14 km MTB, 7 km run) will be a go-er. Not quite the same as the Crazyman duathlon (35 km MTB, 18 km run) I had intended on doing if we had stayed in Wellington, but I’m sure it’ll be just as fun and challenging! I’m looking forward to doing something a bit different, and the duathlon fits the bill quite nicely. Although now I’ll have to buy a new pair of running shoes…
Riding around the Blue Lake at St Bathans, 2004?
PS: If anyone has any photos from this event that they want to share, please email me at psychavoc at gmail.com.
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