18 January 2015: Gorrick Spring Series Round 1, Saddleback Hill, Surrey
Rider Report by “Mudslinger” Seth Kanaris, Juvenile Category
A long hard climb!
The Gorrick Spring Series finally kicked off this past Sunday at Saddleback Hill, a venue that saw to it a great race was had! Being the first MTB XC race of the 2015 season, and hot off the heels of the relaxing festivities over December, I reckon it was a bit of a wake up call for most of us riders wanting to do well in the season ahead, and reaffirming that training is more important than ever – especially as so many riders have moved up age categories!
When I arrived, the first thing I noticed was an overwhelming amount of the Slipstreamers orange and yellow: hopefully this will be consistent throughout the whole series! Unfortunately, I didn’t get the chance to do a recon lap before the race, so I had to use my knowledge of the local area, having ridden there a few times previously, to predict what was coming up. Lucky for me, the course didn’t take me by surprise, so that wasn’t a drawback. There was a good balance between technical climbs, quick descents, switchbacks, and bits of flowing singletrack to recover – hard work but fun!
Frustrated but at least I finished!
In the end I finished 6th, which I suppose is good, but I was very annoyed with the result at the same time. I say this because my bike gave me a lot of trouble – now I know how blaming my equipment sounds, but it’s not me being a sore loser… I mean, tell me if I’m wrong, but it does set you back when your forks have collapsed on the first technical section and your chain keeps dropping every time you pedal hard, right? Literally, on the last bit of open track I started to sprint so I could stay in front of the guy behind me, but my chain dropped off the ring just before the last singletrack bit! And as if that wasn’t bad enough, seconds before the finish line I attempted to pip him at the post, but the chain jumped and I went over the bars! Needless to say, I immediately picked the bike back up, gave it a once-over, and finished within seconds of the person in front – but I was still very frustrated!!
Well that’s my rant over – but all that aside, it was an awesome race! There was a lot of competition as is usually the case with the Gorrick races, the course was actually really good, and the presence of BC scouts gave me that extra bit of motivation! Anyway, I hope to see more Slipstreamers at Round 2 on the 8th February!
Seth came 6th in his age category – well done!
Full set of round 1 results here