A much, much better day at the office

Event report – Dark and White Winter League rd 3 – Grindleford

My training diary on Saturday showed no training for 10 days due to a cold I picked up off of Holly. With the cold still there I wasn’t sure that I ought to race today really. Manic bike maintenance on Saturday night after driving home from Somerset didn’t help either but I put the bike in the car anyway and decided to make a decision on Sunday morning.

Trips up through The Peaks are always a pleasure early on Sunday mornings with no traffic on the road and this morning was no exception. Arriving at the event centre in Grindleford it was good to see Emily Benham, Britain’s current MTBO superstar who bagged a silver out in Lithuania, though being a poor student she was forced to cycle to and from Sheffield to take part. After my last effort at a Dark and White Event I spent a good 1.5 mins having a look possible routes and realised that again it was not going to be possible to get them all.

I decided to leave the lower value controls around Eyam to the end and headed out up on to Baslow Edge, with stunning views out to the west.  The day was characterised by vicious climbs and very fast descents, but as I am still without a replacement for my GPS I didn’t get a total height gain or max speed.
I decided to put a physcological demon to bed my diving down into Cressbrook and attacking the long climb out after bagging a control. A bad experience in the past given me the knowledge that the climbs are much bigger than those indicated on the map and I was a little hesitant at going back down there.

Looking at my watch I was ahead of schedule so a quick bit of re-planning brought in another huge climb at the end up through Eyam to Sir William Hill, again with stunning views back across the valley. However the climb told and I arrived at the control with no time left so I let rip on the final 250m decent into Grindleford.

A mistake on a road junction added to my lateness  by a minute or so but I was only 51/2 mins late in the end.

Now full results are published and I was 3rd (several Vets upgraded themselves into Open) which I am very happy with.

Mark Stodgell ( Stodge ) 

     

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