My poor performance at the first national really knocked by confidence, I should have taken away some positive from that race having ridden within the top 10 UK riders for the first 4 laps but instead I’ve struggled to put that day behind me and the negatives are still fresh in my mind. Going into the season I set some pretty high targets and to see them disappear into the distance gave my moral a real kicking.
Normally after a bad race there’s time to bounce back by racking up some decent quality training miles but since Sherwood there’s been events each week meaning there’s not been the chance to do much riding. Leading into the second national the pain and disappointment I experienced at Sherwood was still fresh in my mind.
In a regional race where the competition isn’t so fierce and success is more likely there’s less chance of your mindset being tested. However 10 minutes into this past weekends race at Dalby Forest all those negatives came flooding back. I should have been able to just enjoy riding the awesome track but as my motivation to push the pedals at anywhere near racing speed disappeared so did the race.
On lap 4 I did finally start to have a little fun railing the banked corners on the first couple of descents, and sprinting up the early climb to the arena. Having easily dropped the group of riders who were sat behind me the chain dropped off the outside of my chainset. The chain had twisted possibly during an earlier fall, this was causing the gears to slip under load. As the riders I’d dropped rode back past me my race was over, I saw no point in continuing.
Racing isn’t just a battle of fitness but it’s a battle of mind. What I need to do now is resort back to having fun on the bike, start enjoying training, and then the success with come.
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