Another evening of fantastic weather brought the Dark and White league to Millers Dale on the Monsal Trail near to Tideswell, a new location for me. I recognised a couple of tracks in the area but most of the map was unfamilar.
I started fairly late after getting stuck in Stockport’s nightmare that is 5pm and spent slightly longer planning a route than the normal cursory glance and the headed off up towards #3 planning to try and get them all. I think the planning was fairly kind as many competitors had spent the weekend competing either at the MTBO British Champs or the Polaris.
I was feeling really strong on the hills and was very confident on the navigation, relying mainly on map memory to keep things smooth.
The views were spectacular, with the whole of the White Peak unfolding below as we circumnavigated one of the higher areas of the South Peak District.
Feeling I was going to comfortably make it in in time with all the controls I relaxed a little and then made a mistake, cruising past a road junction on the way to #4 losing myself about 3 mins as I climbed back up cursing my lapse of concentration. It was then a race against the clock giving it all along the Monsal Trail to avoid being late back which I knew would drop me from a likely tied first place. I made it with 15 secs to spare.
Killian, Ben Plowman and I all had cleared the course in under 2 hours, giving us a tied first place. Looking at the splits Killian and I are just a couple of seconds apart on legs now so the racing in Denmark will be very close.
Results available at here..
stats – 1hour 59 mins 47 secs, 42.6km ridden