Holiday in Dubai

One of the many problems with working full time and trying to race competitively is trying to get leave from work that coincides with bike races that need traveling or multi-stage races.

This scenario I was able to organise a week of leave three months in advance. This was the first leave period I was taking in one year and one month! Because I had to organise this three months in advance as well as organising the over seas travel that it also entailed, it is very difficult to find the best time period that fits in with my training and racing schedule as well! There was not much time to think! The leave was granted and the flights needed to be booked otherwise we would loose out on the good air fare rate. Unfortunately this time period coincided with the week of the Cape Epic. At the time of organising the holiday, I wasn't going to be able to do the Cape Epic. Little did I know that much closer to the time an opportunity to compete in the Epic came my way and obviously it was too late for me to scrap all the holiday plans and of coarse all the money that had already been spent.

Jayde and I were off to Dubai. What an awesome holiday it was! I had an amazing time and it was even better that I got to spend it with my number one girl and also to see my sister Tracy and Evan for the first time in 18 months! There is so much to do there and I think we did just about everything in the 8-days we were there!

- Two water parks: Wild Wadi and Atlantis hotel
- Desert safari 4x4 extreme dune bashing
- Indoor snow skiing
- Chilling on the beach at Mamzar, teaching Jayde to body-surf
- Travelling through two of the other Emirates: Sharjah and Fujairah, seeing the desert mountains, swimming and snorkeling around Snoopy Island rock where we swam with a turtle!
- Shopping at 5 different malls
- Seeing the worlds tallest building and the amazing fountain show from all perspectives (even from the 63 floor of the Address building at night!)
- We even got to go tubing behind a boat in the warm blue waters of the Gulf and seeing Dubai from the sea
- We also got to go to Tracy and Evans church and see Evan at his best leading worship

So Dubai was my first overseas holiday without involving some form of racing and what a great time it was! Now getting back home it is time to reduce the calorie intake and increase the time on the bike! Next race MTN mountain biking cross-country national in Maritzburg followed by the MTN mountain biking marathon national in Clarens.

Argus mtb race

Another race and another two punctures!

Another heat wave saw temperatures reaching the 40 degrees Celsius mark out on the 55km route of the Cape Argus Mountain Bike Challenge! Unlike Xterra two weeks ago this race started at a more reasonable time. However, that still wasn't enough as the race doctor had to cut the race for the back markers along the way short due to the extreme heat.

I was ready for this race, ready to give it everything I had! I was even more rearing to go this time round due to my mechanical disasters that put me out of contention at Sabie the previous week.

All started well with a firing pace to begin with seeing a front group of about 10 riders form early on. The short fast rocky downhills and tight corners determined an even further split up of the field. And then as soon as the roads tilted upward the gaps among the riders further increase. It was at this point where I felt that I had the legs and was feeling good and even more confident as I was riding in 3rd position only a few meters off the leader Conrad Stoltz and gaining ground up the climb. It was unfortunately also at this point when I went down a short sharp hill over a rough rocky patch and cut a whole in my back tyre! I got off my bike to try and spin my rear wheel to get the Stans to seal the whole but it was too large. So, off with the tyre and rim tape and in with a tube. Not too long and I was back on the saddle and making ground. I believed that I would be able to catch back up and finish with a decent position.

I experienced one hiccup along the way shortly after my puncture. There was a decent amount of downhill single tracks and as I was further back in the field among other riders I was getting held up a bit on the single tracks. At one point I was gunning it down this one section to overtake another rider in order to enter the next single track section in front on him but only ended up with my face in the dirt as I didn't make the corner!

Again back on my bike and making up ground I encounted yet another flat rear wheel!!! This time it was a thorn and because I was forced to put a tube in from my previous flat there was no hope. Fortunately for me the man behind my sponsor Blend Property Group, Martin Epstein, was not far behind me at this stage and stopped to give me his spare tube. Thanks Martin, because if it wasn't for you I don't know if I would have been able to face patching up tubes along the way again like the previous week at Sabie! Although this time I was out of bombs and had to pump the tyre up with my ever faithful little MicroRocket pocket pump. This did however, take a little while.

Back on the bike again this time round I had now lost far too much time to try catch back up over a 55km race and I just rode my own race and tried to catch up as much as I possibly could over the remaining distance. As with everyone else, the heat did get to me as I had to stop three times to drink Coke and water and pour water over myself to cool down. I would never have thought of stopping like this in a 55km race!

I eventually got to the finish without any further hassle. But now I really need another race to give it another go!

MTN SA marathon mtb Champs: Sabie

Sabie is the land of endless up hills! I don't recall riding more than 500m on a flat stretch during the 110km race. It is mountain biking after all and the route was all that with just over 2600m of climbing.

Hard consistent rain throughout the evening before left the course very muddy. I was not too concerned about this as my tyres that I managed to get hold of just before I left Cape Town handled the wet muddy track brilliantly! The race started with a 13km climb that took us from an altitude of 1000m up to 1900m! This resulted in the field getting strung out right from the beginning! I managed a good solid pace up this never ending climb and reached the summit placed relatively well in the top 20 just a few minutes back from the leading duo of Kevin Evans and Burry Stunder. Being SA Champs, the start line was packed with all the big names of mountain biking in South Africa! This is always exciting for me as I can see how I shape up against the others and gage my improvement as I grow in my relatively new found sport of mountain biking.

Unfortunately it wasn't going to be one of those races. As it turned out after only 30km into the race while I was still riding amongst a handful of riders placed in the top 20 of the field I experienced my first flat tyre. This occurred while descending the other side of the mountain after the long first climb. My back tyre must have lost a bit of air and I hit a rock at speed causing the side wall of the tyre to pinch. So after a while of trying to bomb my tyre back up only to realise the whole in the side wall was too big for the Stans to seal it, it was in with a tube and off I went making my way back through the field of riders.

25km later, after catching up and passing plenty of other riders while going down another rocky hill at pace I got that dreaded feeling again! Looking down I saw my back tyre was flat AGAIN! This time it was a pinched tube, one of the reasons tubes no longer have a place in mountain biking as far as I'm concerned. So now I had to first try and locate the whole on the tube and then patch it up! I can't believe I was actually making use of my little patch kit along the way!

After fixing my second flat, it was at a stage in the course where we had joined onto the route of the 40km event. Unfortunately I had to then try weave my way through the masses of fun riders. This was a difficult task in itself on the narrow gravel roads and jeep tracks, let alone the single tracks! There it was impossible to ride as there was a line of riders in front slowly making their way through the muddy single tracks.

Reaching the 70km mark I was way back in the field and highly frustrated! I have to admit that after my second puncture and getting stuck behind the 40km fun riders I thought my race was going to be over at the 70km mark where we pass the start/finish area and I wasn't going to carry on with the last 40km loop to complete the 110km. However, at this point I found my two most loyal supporters there to give me so much needed encouragement. And after a quick touch of lube to my chain and some Coke, I was heading off on the last 40km of the race.

I simply cannot bring myself to pulling out of a race. There is something inside of me that when I start something I have to complete it no matter what the outcome is going to be. In this case I ended up finishing quite far back in the field and had a finishing time that made me have to rush back to my B&B afterwards so that I didn't have to pay a late check out fee!

In the end I was happy to have just finished as it was good training and as always there was experience gained!

And Sabie didn't get the better of me!