Looking ahead in 2013

Time to fire up the blog again as 2013 is going to be an exciting season.

This year I will be racing for Terra footwear Bicycleline and be based in Zottegem, Belgium.

The season has already kicked off to a good start, with a successful Tour of Southland I had a little bit of time off to spend travelling the South Island. After that I was able to build the form from Southland up towards Nationals.

From the experience gained and learnt from my season last year I had big goals for Nationals, both in the Time Trial and Road Race. I invested a lot of more time on my time trial bike than I have in the past and worked on a lot of aspects off the bike like Nutrition, Bike Position and Gym work.

Finally the time arrived and I was off to Nationals. The time trial is a very straight and plain 40km race with only 1 corner on the way out the same corner to navigate on the way home. Although I wasn’t overly pleased with my own personal performance I still placed a respectable 3^rd, gaining my first National Road Medal.

Two days later was the 180km Road Race on the same course it has been on for the last 3 years. There is one prominent climb that withers down the field and it never seems to get easier, each year we only seem to go up there faster. I was feeling a lot stronger today than I did on the day of the time trial, but the nerves were a lot greater due to how unpredictable one day road races can be. I had a race plan to keep myself protected as much as possible and make my move towards the end of the race. I battled all the way to the finish and in the bunch kick placed 6^th u23.

To finish the nationals road race is an achievement in itself, with over 80 starters we had one of the highest number of finishers with a total of 20 riders making it to the end. The race is notorious for its high attrition rate.

For me now I am focusing on another little break and working to raise funds for my time in Europe. Then I will be keeping my riding pretty basic and least likely going to do any racing. My riding will be based around “collecting k’s” and build my legs up for what will be a long but good season of racing in Europe.