Thredbo + Mt. Buller

Its been weeks since Thredbo national actually took place. But i find it hard to find time to type all the races up. but i am actually doing it.

Me and my friend Aaron drove the 7 hour drive up to thredo for the national round #3. I had heard all about the long, fast, and really rough course. Thredbo is the highest mountain in Australia just going over 2000 metres. Also one of the few alpine ranges that lay in Australia. Being on a tight budget i found the $210 dollar entry fee a bit steep but supposedly everything is in Thredbo. Right after registering for the race i caught up with my bunk buddy Tracey Hannah. Then we went off to arrange our accommodation. we soon found out that men and women cannot stay in the same room at our cheap hostel. and that meant no splitting the room fee 50/50. Bullshit if you ask me! so there is another $200 dollars out the door.(the owner said that was half price...it wasn't) so with an expensive room, and a expensive number plate. that meant i was down to less than $400 dollars on the first day.
anyway we got on with practice on the second day. after learning the nearly 7 minute course i began riding really well. The course was pretty basic, PINNED,FULL THROTTLE, one line the whole way down. and also really rough. but i managed to stay loose and relaxed the whole time. during the second day i really began to turn it on. I felt my goal of a top 10 result getting closer and closer. And finally race night all my good practice went through the drain as it began pouring rain. and it didnt stop raining once until after the race. But my first practice run of race day was a definite fun one. Me and my mate Nick did the first one together. The first part of the course started out on a fire road with HUGE waste high water bars that you hit going about 40mph. and they put you well over 6 feet in the air and since you were going so fast you probably cleared about 30 to 50 feet. they reminded me of riding moto! SOOO FUN! just had to talk about those. but the course had got so much rain that it was like riding down a small creek. not to slippery though. just really wet. and after that first run we decided to call it our last for practice. and by the time our qualifying run came time the course had completely changed. holes were everywhere, it had gotten slippery and now i had to put together a good full run. it was a super hard course now but i got through and qualified 26th. only 30 people qualified so i definitely cut it close... but right after i came down a big storm was on its way over and they had to call off finals. so i got screwed. 26th... bummer. but i did learn some important things so maybe thats better than a result.


MT. BULLER

this race was just a small state race. Mt. buller is a cool venue with the village on the top of the mountain,and nothing on the bottom of the hill. it takes some time to get used to,but is really cool aswell. The course we were racing is not the preferred one to ride but i found it fun,and at least we had a chairlift. Practing with one of Vic's fastest racers,Lincoln Verass was fun too. he knew the course well and got my confidence up once i was keeping on his back tire. During race day i was struggling to keep a flow going and was loosing concentration easily. qualifying went ok, i just looked for lines that i knew wern't going to have big holes in them during finals. i qualified 8th with a cruising run. so i knew i could get in the top 5. my final run was going good until a small fall in a corner caused from loss in concentration. after my fall i was determined to make up the time. i was going real well after that until the fastest part of the track i drifted a little bit outside of my line and hit a small sharp rock and flatted my front tire. Oh well thats racing!!!

Now im looking foreward to the Australian Championships in Canberra this coming weekend. and then the following weekend in Mt.Beauty. In a few weeks ill do a post on how things went.

Cheers if you actually read all this Bullshit!