WDMBA ROUND THREE, MOUNTAIN ASH 10th JULY 2011
This was the boy’s first visit to Mountain Ash, an old Dragon Downhill course that was last raced in 2007. Situated on the southern slopes of the same South Wales mountain that has Gethin on the northern slopes.
We arrived on Friday night with the idea that it would be less of a rush in the morning giving Isaac and Joel plenty of time to walk the course. We had heard that the track was lengthy and the boy’s wanted time to study their lines before the uplift started.
It rained pretty much all Friday night and we awoke to some wet conditions. Isaac and Joel headed up the mountain at about 7.30am returning at about 9.00am discussing everything they had spotted. Their main observations were that it was long, flat and pedalily. After a bit of breakfast they broke out the Beef Cakes and headed for the uplift.
I think they completed three or four runs before lunch in changeable weather conditions, some intermittent rain and mainly overcast. The best way to some up the track was greasey with running water on several sections particularly one area about a third of the way down where the track passes through a thick conifer wood. There was one spot where riders had to drop off a large wet log that was causing lots of trouble for many competitors.
After some lunch they were off again. The rain had stopped and the ground was beginning to stiffen. Suddenly, their speeds were increasing and the track was beginning to flow. Wide grins were appearing across competitors faces. With that however came the injuries, Isaac took a dive twisting his wrist back and Joel had a strange incident with his over wide handle bars aggravating a previous injury to his elbow. For Joel it was quick change to smaller bars. Isaac just had to carry on.
Sunday dawned after a clear and dry night. The track was now completely different, mainly dry and dusty but still areas of running water in the trees. We bound Isaac’s wrist up and away they went. A couple of clean practice laps each it was time to go racing.
As usual, Hardtails first, some were taking about 6 minutes to get to the bottom meaning at any one time there could be 7 or 8 riders on track. The Juvenile’s were a bit quicker and then it was the Youth’s. Unfortunately, one competitor crashed ahead of Joel and with so many riders on track at one time meant that about ten or so were red flagged and had to head back to the top for a re-run.
So it was Isaac who made a competitive entrance first coming in with a time of 3.57 putting him into 5th place. Moss Macriner had a cracking time of 3.51 to put him into 1st place 6 seconds ahead of George Belk in 2nd. Isaac and I discussed how he could make up such a large gap and we agreed that he would attempt to break the 3.50 barrier in his second run.
Joel and his fellow riders were slotted in after the Senior category. Joel was last man down coming home with a time of 4.19 which put him middle order in his category. No time to discuss anything, it was straight on the uplift to start his second attempt.
The categories were re-seeded and Joel managed to improve his time with 4.13 putting him into sixteenth place. A nice result in a large category and as I tell everybody if he was 6 or 7 weeks younger he would still be a Juvenile and would have finished second. So there is still load’s of time for him to show us his full metal.
Now on to the Junior’s and the times were getting shorter with successive riders crossing the finish line and then out of the blue Isaac arrived with a cracking time of 3.48.68. Billy Matthews and Grant Boyce were unable to get below 3.55 and George Belk and Jay Williamson were unable to get below 3.48 leaving only Moss on the hill. As usual we nervously awaited his arrival which unfortunately for Isaac was quicker than anticipated. Moss posted a time of 3.47.99 putting him into first place.
So, it was close but not meant to be on this occasion but 0.69 seconds is pretty tight. We were all really delighted. Not to mention that Isaac was the only first year junior on the podium.
Absolutely no problems with the Beef Cakes, the boy’s are lovin’ them.
Again, the boys would like to thank everyone at Rose Bikes for all the continued support and are very excited about the National Champs at Llangollen in a couple of weeks, a track that is the complete opposite to Mountain Ash, steep, tight, technical and absolutely no pedalling! Watch this space.
- Duncan Anderson
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