Woman down

Hello again,

I am writing this in pain as I have crashed my bike once more, nothing serious, but enough to put me off the bike for a few days, again. First I want to rewind to last Saturday and a brilliant sunny ride at Mabie with Gael, the first short sleeve ride of the year and my first time riding the red trail there.

I have visited before but the conditions closed in and 2ft visibility and 1ft of snow meant that I cut the ride short after the first, short loop, and had never been back to complete the bigger loop - Mabie is a figure of 8 layout with the first loop being about 20% of the total. What a blast! The trail here is a lot more natural feeling than the likes of Glentress, with more roots and naturally occurring slabs making a lot of the features, and some massive man-made berms to add some contrast. There were quite a few cars parked but once on the trail we were practically alone for the whole day, meeting a lady at our first breather spot, we met her a few times, overtaking and being overtaken as we each rested and drank water, until we eventually lost her too and had the trails to ourselves. This probably explains the natural feel of the place, the lower traffic means less damage and repair work is needed so the trails don't get so 'sanitised'. I really enjoyed the flow of the trails and with all my riding and skills practice recently I definitely noticed an improvement in my speed and riding ability, I was riding the trail faster blind than I used to ride trails I know well.

I look forward to returning to Mabie now that I have a better idea of it and see how much faster I can go. One of the features is a stream crossing, which leads onto a climb (called Scorpion so I am told), after sessioning the stream to get photos we carried on and there was the scorpion, looming above me, I dropped down a few gears and attacked it, overtaking Gael (she is a downhill demon but hates the climbs!) and was giving it my all to get to the plateau in the trail, Gael was cheering me on, so I dug deep, dropped to granny ring and span my way up the last steep bit to the fire road, gasping for breath but proud of myself, that was a sharp climb and I did it, now I have to do it every time I visit! After finishing the red route we popped along to the freeride park and had some fun on the jumps, Gael was trying to teach me some of her skills, I have a long way to go but can now get both wheels off the ground and land in a controlled manner, progress!

On Sunday I marshalled the POC enduro at Ae forest, stationed at the start of the 4th stage I once again got to unleash my awful banter on each and every rider. My job there is to make sure they all set off the timer as they start the stage, it's great fun seeing the different lines and styles of all the riders from the pro's to the first timers. I might even go and try riding some of this stuff soon and maybe even enter a race next year, but for now I am enjoying the social aspect of marshalling, living the van life and helping the races happen whilst enjoying views like this!

Back to last night, BMX Wednesday, I moved it to an outdoor track for a change as the weather is great and it won't last in Glasgow so we have to make the most of it. I was a bit late in arriving and there was a fairly large squad riding when I got there, brilliant! Most of the folks were my mates but there were some local kids too, which always makes for good banter. I had decided to take it easy, having hurt my shoulder at BMX last week, I had been nursing it all week and this was my first ride since Mabie where I noticed it was not quite right. Shorts, tee, knee pads, helmet, all present and correct, I did a few laps and felt great, I was faster, smoother and better than my last visit to the track at the end of last summer, all this riding really is paying off! I started applying my teachings from Gael to the tabletop jumps and was noticing an improvement, I was getting about halfway over them, yay! Setting off from the start ramp on one lap I think my foot slipped off the pedal, I don't really know, but next thing I knew was a pain in my lower abdomen, I am sliding face down along the floor and the thunk as my helmet connected with the gravel floor. Ouch. Luckily I walked away fairly unscathed, some bruising to my internal bits n bobs, a couple of grazes and a bruised ego. After checking in the van that all was ok I donned my elbow pads and swapped my helmet for a full facer and returned to ride again, so that my last memory was not of a face plant! I managed about 3 laps before conceding that my leg was actually pretty painful and calling it quits for the night. Thanks to good friends I made it home and onto the couch with a cup of tea and bag of frozen peas. My leg hurts to extend it fully, I am walking with a limp, and feeling sorry for myself, but as I was wearing knee pads and a helmet I walked away just fine. From now on full pads and full face helmet at the track at all times for me, especially as I am wanting to go faster and jump now. Lesson learned. Here's my pathetic grazes that do not in any way represent the pain caused by landing on the pointy end of a handlebar! - "That's a Booboo" - Neil Macmillan

This week I have mostly been wearing Threadless Tees and continuing to rock the double denim. I may need to rest and not bike this weekend, I shall play it by ear, but I have plenty of plans including leaving parties, Roller Derby to go and see and dear friends to visit, so even without bikes this will be a great weekend. Until next time keep it rubber side down folks! 

Tough Chick Thursday Three

Back to the weekly entry on fitness and all that jazz. In the first one I covered diet and last week I spoke in depth about bikes and where my passion comes from, today I will go into what else I do for fitness and my goals. 

Until my crash in which I dislocated my shoulder I just cycled, no other exercise. I enjoy being outside, I hate gyms and I am rubbish at team sports, I was happy riding my bikes up and down mountains, to work, at the skatepark, it was all about the bikes. Whilst forced off the bike for 6 weeks I had some exercises from the doctor to ensure I healed properly and to minimise the damage, once I was back on the bike I continued the exercises but still felt like my upper body strength was not where I wanted it, and I got frequent pain in the affected shoulder. I bought some home gym equipment and now work on my core and upper body a few times a week, fitting a workout in most evenings I am home which is usually only two or three nights tops. As I said I am not a fan of gyms so this works best for me, it also means I can fit it in whenever suits me and it can be a quick blast whilst dinner cooks or a longer session depending on how I feel and how big the ironing pile is. 

I am a believer in using what you have so I do a lot of body weight exercises such as push ups, sit ups, pull ups and planks, well, I say I do a lot, I attempt them a lot, but am still working on achieving many! I use small dumbells to help build the strength in my arms and shoulders, lots of light reps (5kg) as I don't need to build massive arms, just keep my shoulders and arms strong enough to fend off crashes better. 

At work and for some of my weights exercises at home I sit on a gym ball, this has drastically improved my balance and posture in just a few weeks, and it is something I will continue to do. After a day on the gym ball I stand and sit taller, walk straighter, my shoulder blades sit in the right place and I don't slouch. I also suffer less from back pain, which I often get as a result of compressed lower vertebrae caused in an accident 18 years ago. 

On top of these exercises and as a warm down after most sessions I have started to incorporate a yoga routine into my evenings, it is a routine I found on the pinkbike website and it is specially designed for bikers and targeting lower back pain specifically. What I have learned from this is my balance is truly awful and I am not as flexible as I would like, but am working on it and improving with each session, hopefully by the summer the improvements will show on the bike too. 

I am still working on cultivating abs by my birthday, crunches and weighted sits ups are my best friend and worst enemy right now, there is no reason to do this apart from mild vanity and stubbornness, but I will persevere! 

I plan on continuing this regime for a while and hopefully building up some upper body strength through this and maybe working on some calisthenics workouts, or maybe I will just admire videos of the people who can do that stuff and never manage it myself! Bmx Wednesday is being brought out of the park and I will start mixing it with alternate weeks at the bmx race track to work on sprints, manuals and jumping whilst enjoying the few warm nights we might get in Glasgow. I need to start cycling to work again, I have been lazy recently and keep walking instead, and I need to get some evening mtb rides in, the nights are lighter so no more excuses. Let us ride! 

This week I have been rocking some double denim for fun, a bowtie and waistcoat combo and riding my awesome chrome and pink bmx.. until next week, bikes, bikes bikes!!

Girls DH day Inners

As the title suggests Friday was another brilliant day of bikes. Rona Strivens had posted on the Foxy Riders United page if any ladies fancied a day on the Uplift Scotland trailer at Innerleithen. I signed up, this was before I had ridden Ae and before my trip to Bike Park Wales. I was scared, nervous and excited about the prospect of riding some seriously steep and scary trails on my bike. I am way over biked for most of the riding I do with 160mm front and back suspension, but the point of buying that bike was that I could do uplift days and other downhill oriented days on it, so time to "Woman up" and commit.

On the day the uplift was fully booked with 16 keen riders, more than 50% of us were female, thats a fantastic turnout on a weekday! Here's a photo of most (not all) the girls who were present in our psychedelic glory! I am the vision in yellow on the left, Rona is on the right in the brill pink Flare shorts!

I missed the first run of the day as I set off on time, but on the M8 I passed a car with a wheel missing, then my friend Gael's (Green shorts in the photo) car on the hard shoulder... Yep her boyfriend Scouse had managed to send his rear wheel into the central reservation, luckily no-one was hurt! I doubled back and loaded all the kit from the car into my van and pressed on to Inners whilst they sorted the cars and followed in Gael's car.

Getting ready for uplift two and Marianne (black and white in the photo) turned up, I was relieved to not be the only late one jumping on the 2nd uplift. Marianne had brought Harry the dog to see if he might make a good trail dog. He will not, I think I ran him over at one point, oops, but he seems to like me judging from the kisses he was giving me. Thanks Harry!

Bikes loaded onto the trailer and we set off to the top of the hill. Gael was still en-route and was meant to be giving me some guidance for this new type of riding, so Marianne stepped up and offered to guide me down my first run of the day. We started at the top of a track called Tunnel, which looked fine, but looking behind me I could see the steep line in from a track further up, leading to a road-gap jump into the line we were about to try. What had I let myself in for?! Ahh well, here goes... Follow the black and white warrior and hope for the best! 

The first section allows you to pick up a LOT of speed, I was on the brakes pretty soon to keep my acceleration to a minimum, it is easy to see that letting go would allow for some fun jumping action in the woods, but I will work up to wheels off the ground once my confidence and skills are up to it. After the straight line of jumps the trail gets a bit twisty with berms, roots and rocks pushing, pulling and firing you down into more trees, with multiple line options and some technical sections. I fell apart on a section called Luge, all the options looked really tricky and I was already struggling to keep up with my guide. I minced my way down and onwards to a section made of some nice 180 degree switchback berms, at least I did after hanging too far off the back of my bike in sheer fear and having my leg dragged into my bike by my knobbly tyre. OUCH. There were bad words. Lesson learned though, get forward, be strong, be aggressive. I made it down most of the switchbacks without too much bother though I had to walk a few bits, I met Marianne at the fireroad ready to pick the next line. 

The entrance to the next section started with a small run in, but this had a long drop to the left and I could not get the thought of my Dalbeattie crash (dislocated shoulder) out of my head, I took a couple of attempts at committing to it, but in the end I had to walk in and set off from the first berm, I will have to work on my confidence when the ground vanishes to the side! Eventually, tired, arms and legs aching, we were back in the car park, having missed the 3rd uplift due to my need to track walk and discuss all the options and my wee paddy at the fireroad, so a bit of much needed rest was had before jumping back on the land rover for another go.  

Despite protests and offers of help from Gael, Marianne and other lovely ladies I opted to spend the rest of the day sessioning the same track alone. I find I ride at my best when I ride within myself, if I am following someone I tend to forget to focus on myself, and if someone is following me I get too worried about them, but alone I am able to concentrate and get myself in the best frame of mind to ride. I rode Tunnel, getting faster each time, until I scared myself hitting a tree stump and almost pinged over the bars, so I reigned it in a bit. After Tunnel is Luge, and I almost got better at that, I had 3 lie down's in the woods, but with a bit more speed I know I can ride that tricky section, not bad considering I looked at it on the first go with Marianne and thought "no way, just no.". At the fireroad I decided to pedal uphill and join Janes Lane, a trail I rode on a coaching day with Jess Stone in February, it is tight, twisty, rooty and a level up form my riding in technical terms. By the end of the day I could very nearly ride it all, there are still some gremlins for me to defeat, I will return for them soon.

Popping out of Janes Lane brings you to the second half of Caddon Bank, a whooping, undulating, rocky trail which can be fast and furious if you have the skills. On the coaching day I had struggled a lot with this, despite having ridden it before, I am always scared on it, the downs are steep and I have a massive fear of it. I followed Jess that day and on each of the undulations I held my breath, got to the top at an almost standstill and then let go of the brakes and hoped for the best. By the last one Jess could see I was pretty stressed out so tried to challenge me by telling me I was about to ride the steepest bit of trail I had ever ridden. It worked, I was frozen. No matter what she did, including holding my bike for me, I could not let go of the brakes, I got so stressed out and gave up.

Not today. I got to the whoops, and I was in my element, none of them scared me, I was flowing and enjoying it like the first time I rode it, before this fear developed. I got to the last one, I knew it was 'that one', but I did'nt hesitate, I looked at it, looked at the opposing summit and went for it, what a rush. This was not a technical bit of trail, I have done it before, but the relief of getting that monkey off my back was amazing. I flew down the final berm and jumps, powered into the car park and got straight on my phone to let Jess know I had defeated it. Her coaching worked, albeit a little later on, but that is because I am a major stress head and far too hard on myself. I got back on the uplift and rode these same trails for the rest of the day, by then end I was overtaking people on Caddon Bank, try telling stressed out me that that would have happened on that first uplift, phew!

I might not have graduated to the scary trails but my riding improved so much over one day. I will be going back as soon as I can to rinse and repeat that same combination until I can ride it all clean. Uplift Scotland means I can practice the same thing over and over in one day, this means I can see a measurable improvement each run. I love this. I will be riding the scarier stuff one day, but for now I am so happy to be able to ride any dh trail at all and to be pushing my riding up a level again. I just need to remember to stop being hard on myself, I will never be the best, I learn by repetition, so just keep on trying, I am improving!

Thanks Rona, and well done to all the ladies who came along, you inspire me!

Roadtrip Roundup

What a weekend!

Visited Bikepark Wales with a group of brilliant bike folk this weekend. Took a leisurely drive from Glasgow to Merthyr Tydfil via Kendal for a brilliant carvery lunch at Romney's, if you're in the area go check them out, cracking grub!

We had a group of 11 and most stayed in the Butchers Arms Bunkhouse, Gael is posh and stayed in a Premier Inn and Stuart crashed in his car to keep his bike company whilst I had the luxury dwellings of Vangelina, my DIY stealth camper van. Vangelina has a bed, heater, lights, stove, bike storage, usb charger sockets, everything I need for nights out in the hills, and best of all I did all the work myself (proud moment)! Friday night went off with a bang with us all drinking the local beer 'Double Dragon' and planning our day on the hill, before retiring to rest up for a big day ahead.

Saturday began with us congregating in the carpark and driving to BPW for the amazing breakfast at 8.30, only the cafe did not open till 9 and someone had forgotten to update the website, so a bit of hanging about and we missed the first uplift, but got an amazing feast of a meal and then headed up. What makes Bikepark Wales unique is the brilliant, efficient uplift service, we were never queuing for more than a few minutes and we were swiftly ferried up the hill to the starting point for all the trails. From the top you can choose from two each of blue, red and black trails, each one is a bit different and they are all great fun (the ones I did anyway). Last time I was in Wales I rode the two blue trails in a mediocre fashion and walked some of the steeper bits on them, this time I smashed the blues to bits, getting faster and faster until I scared myself, it's great to be able to see an improvement in my riding! I even managed to ride both the red trails to a decent standard and with a bit of practice on drops I am sure I will be able to ride them with a bit of flow and grace next time! Here I am with the trail map at the top of the hill, and my beloved YT Wicked!

The blues were great fun. With memories from a year ago of "Melted Welly" being a bit pedally I was keen to hit "Sixtapod" for my first run, and second and third... It's just so much fun! Fast, flowy, jumpy, bermy goodness! Later on I did venture down Melted Welly and I wished I had done so sooner, it was twisty, bermy, flowy fun, with some roots and other fun stuff thrown in! If you go for a visit I highly recommend both the blue trails, even if you're a black level rider, as they are great fun trails, and you can get a LOT of speed on them, especially Sixtapod and Blue Belle. The reds were great fun, a little more intimidating but all rollable, it is easy to build confidence and go faster each run. There was one drop between two trees on "Wibbly Wobbly" that I walked each time, but I aim to ride that next time. "Vicious Valley" is more twisty and turny to Wibbly Wobbly's drops and rock steps, it splits into two in the woods with "A470" being a motorway of drops that I looked at but did not attempt, but instead continued down Vicious Valley and "Rim Dinger" to the uplift truck. I went back to blues as I preferred to get faster and better on these than hurt myself on the reds until I can come back with better skills for the drops, I did get faster, much faster, it was like a rollercoaster, wheeeeee!!!! Fun times!!

After a day of shredding trails (I managed 8 uplifts and my legs were dying) we went back to the bunkhouse for more Double Dragon, much needed food and more Double Dragon (hic). By about 10pm I was tucked up in my van and asleep within seconds, happy with tired legs and a full belly. 

9am saw us descend back on the park for more bacon based goodness before another full day of uplifts. The first two runs were tough on my feeble legs, and my brakes were squealing like a demented banshee, all I kept thinking was "lay off the brakes" but my hands seemed to think otherwise. After 4 pre-lunch descents I took the bike to the shop at the bottom of the hill and a wizard of a mechanic sorted me with new discs and sanded my pads, off I went to the top. What a difference... silent brakes is one bonus, but they were at least 300% better brakes, so much that on my first run I almost shot out of a berm (banked corner) as the force threw my body weight forward. Once I re-learned how to use my brakes and that I could now feather them instead of always grabbing a fistful, I had the best couple of runs ever! Fast, smooth, QUIET! Amazing! 

The photographers from Airshotz even managed to make me look like I know what I am doing! 

Despite the protests of my group I did not venture onto the black runs, I am not quite ready for that yet, but my riding improved so much that perhaps next time I will be ready to shred them! Key things I want to learn before our next trip (hopefully September) are drops (for some reason I can drop 2ft steps fine but not on a trail), Cold starts (the technical lines with no run in) and leaning the bike more than my body in berms, so I don't wash out so much (3 ouchies). 

The 400 mile drive home felt long and my leg is really sore from crashing on it repeatedly then driving, but I would do it all again tomorrow (or next week when I hurt less). The hill claimed a few casualties over the weekend, Saturday saw 4 ambulances called up the hill for 2 shattered pelvises and one punctured lung amongst other injuries. Thankfully our group 'only' suffered a disgustingly ripped calf muscle which required 6 staples, Neil I am not sharing a photo as it was yucky! Marianne did her best superman impression into a tree and has a wonderfully colourful leg to show for it alongside bruised hands, ribs and everything else, the girl is NAILS! 

Obviously I am a dork so I wore my Bikepark Wales tee with pride on the drive down! 

Here's to practicing drops and berms, keeping it rubber side down and building up to shredding those black runs in September! Let us ride! x