Plans

New plains for this years National Series. I will not be competing at any of the National Series or National Championships for this coming season. The reason for this this the the last week or so I have been sick and have not been training. So I am not in the shape that is needed for me to be competitive at a National level. Also I am moving to Brisbane at the Start of December, which between me finishing school on the 28th of November, having to race on the Sunday for Nationals and then moving houses the next week was not going to work. I will be on the bike training hard again soon in about 3weeks or so once I am fully recovered and have had a nice break from the bike. I will be looking at training hard for the Otway Odyssey and the 2009 State Series, than tackling Nationals as a Second year U19 in a years time.

Freedom Marathon

2 weeks ago saw me take on 40km of Nightcap National Park. We arrived in Byron Bay about 30min away from the race on Friday around mid morning. Dark sky's where above us so tomorrow's race was not looking dry. We set up camp in a holiday village and than went for a walk down to beach to meet up with some other friends. Friday night came and the group went out for dinner at the main beach pub. 7:00pm came around and I headed back to the camp to check over everything for the race. 8:30pm hit and I was in to the sleeping back and off to bed. Woke up at 6am, 4hrs before the race so time to eat and drink. Good news was that the sky was blue, and no rain over night. We left Byron at 8am and arrived at the race just after 830am. Got the bikes off and went down to register. By the time everything was done I had about 20min till race start, so I set off for a bit of a warm up. Turn around and Jason English (BMC) flew past, his warm up is faster than my race pace. After winning the Scott 24hr in Canberra last week he didn't look a tad tired. After the warm up, I took my place on the line ready for the start. The 60km riders went off and then 3min later the 40km took off. 2 of my main rivals Casper and U19 rider and Kerian who rides for Merida in the U23 class, were racing too and us 3 went off hard at the start. Casper took off and the was the last that Kerian and I saw of him till the end of the race. Kerian and I stayed close, alternating second and third between us for the first 25km till... went down into a gully and shot straight up this mud slide of a hill. We both jumped of and ran up the hill trying to stay with each other. Jumped back on the biked and went to push down on the pedal but they didnt move. Jumped back off and looked back and my rear wheel with the chain all mixed up in between ahhh!!!, it was the biggest chain stuck of the year. 10min passed and I was back on pushing hard to catch back up. I realised that I wasnt going to catching him with about 10km to go, so I paced my self up the last hill which was about 124235km long till the last 4km of down hill till the finish line. Crossed the line in 3rd place after 2hr 27min of riding, average HR 180, Average Speed 16.5kph Max 55.1kph. 19min behind Casper, and 5min behind Kerian. Finished 12th last year after 3hrs of riding so got to be happy, 9 places higher and just over 30min faster.

New Bike

When Dan came up for the 8hr from Canberra he brought my new Spats Ti frame built up with all new 09 Sram, Avid, Rockshox, Truvativ parts as followed:

• Avid Juicy Ultimates, White





• Rock Shox Sid Race, Black





• Sram XO Rear Derailleur





• Sram X9 Front Derailleur





• Sram XO Grip Shift





• Truvativ Team carbon flat bar





• Truvativ Team double clamp seat post





• Truvativ Team 100mm steam





• Truvativ Noir cranks 175mm





• ZTR Olympic Wheelset with DT Swiss 240s Hubs





• Selle Italia SLR Saddle





• Ozriders Black Grips





• Xpedo Ti Pedals





• Schwalbe Nobby Nic and Racing Ralph Tires

The bike weights around 9.2kg and rides a soft and smooth as a carbon hard tail or carbon dulie.

8HR

Raced well more like road the Geocentric 8hr last weekend just for a bit of fun. Dan from Canberra flew up and we started off well for the first 6 laps till the heat really started to kick in. The starting pace was fast and dusty so not much room for mistake. I started of for out team of 2 and after the first lap we were in 3rd place, Dan's first lap was the second of the race and he went out hard trying to stay in a podium position. we changed each lap and for about 6 laps we were in 3rd. but then it was almost midday and the sun was blazing down on us. Dan was struggling in the QLD heat and stat out for a bit. I slowly rode around the track just to sock up time and not to smash my self. I did a couple of laps till Dan went out on his last for the day. I then went for another 2 than came home and sat down. by then we had 11laps done with 90min of race time left. We started to pack up so everything was ready to go before I went out on our last lap. Overall the race was physically hard as you wanted to make it, technically not much going for it got pretty boring after the 3rd lap. No first aid there at the race which in that heat wasn't great, as well as not first aid there was no extra water. Not very happy for the entry fee. Dan would of like to been up here for a bit to get used to the heat but that happens it was just a ride not really a race just a fun ride. Dan also brought my new bike up which I raced/rode on and it was great. I will give some more information about that In the next couple of days with some pics.

National Schools Futsal

For those that don't know I like to play a little soccer/futsal and when the chance comes around to represent your state at a National level you normally don't turn it down. Last week I represented Queensland at the 2008 National School Futsal Championships in Melbourne. We arrived in Melbourne on the Sunday and had to wait about 1hr for out bus great... So we got a ball out and pretty much played futsal in Melbourne Airport which was great fun, a Bit of a crowed turned out to watch to so that was fun. Our bus arrived and we where shipped off to the hotel which was a quality place, not. We played 3 games a day Monday against. New Zealand ( W-7-1), SA ( W-10-1), TAS NW ( W-6-1). Tuesday we faced our hardest day TAS SE (W-8-3), VIC ( D-5-5), QLD Country ( L-5-6). By then I had scored 13 goals and was top scorer for my team wooo! Wesnday was finals day and we went into the semi final against QLD Country ready to win. We started of well scoring first with in 2min and than we just when goal for goal, half time it was 3-3 and everyone was ready to pull away, straight off the kick of and we scored one followed by a second a few minutes later. We were winning 5-3 but the team made the mistake of switching off and we conceded 3 goals and lost 5-6. Everyone was pretty pissed so not much was said after that.