Andy takes his first win of the season at a great race at the amazing Kirroughtree 7stanes trail centre.
I started the run at a reasonable pace trying hard to hang on to the fast Jim Haworth as we ascended the woodland trails of the Galloway forest. I couldn’t keep with the strong pace of the leader and I started to drop back, leaving me to suffer on my own with some left hamstring pain from a recent fell race. I remember thinking back to last week’s F1-grandprix at this point in the run, as I felt a bit like Lewis Hamilton trying to conserve tyre wear as I desperately tried to rest my left leg on the difficult bits and corners. Before arriving in to transition there were a couple of steep ‘stings in the tail’ hills to really make sure you were thoroughly cooked before moving on to the bike section.
I had a good transition helped by the consistently brilliant marshaling (who held my bike for me), and went out in 2nd place about 2 minutes back on the solo leader. I really love this trail and the pains soon disappeared as the adrenaline rush hit on the first downhill! I soon got caught by a speedy rider doing the team event, and had a bit of fun trying to hold his wheel for a while down the flowing singletrack. The final descent is the stuff of legends in British mountain bike trails and I was loving it until a puncture about 1 km to the finish. I didn’t even think about stopping (mostly cos I didn’t take a pump!) and bumped my way around the last few corners to take the solo win.
The event was really top class from the organisation, to the courses, to the crowd. A great day topped off by the prize giving of a really nice handmade shield which will be engraved and kept at the visitors centre for subsequent years.
Massive thanks to The Bike Tree in Sheffield for their support.
Even got an interview for BBC Scotland! haha
