Country Cycle Classic

This Saturday was the Inaugural Manawatu Country Cycle Classic. A 160k race starting from the center of Palmerston North and heading out through some nasty rolling back country to finish back on the outskirts of Palmy. I had seen this race about 2 months ago and was pretty keen to have a crack at it. Unfortunatly after all the mountain bike racing and traveling through Feb and March after a heavy road programme in Jan I was feeling pretty run down mentaly. I was fit but tired in the head. I took a week off. After a weeks training and two races, A local club race and West coast champs I was motivated and ready to get stuck in again. I kept my self fairly fresh all week leading up to the race. Weather was predicting wet and cold, but fortunatly the rain held off till late in to the race and was quite warm. A tough race panned out and after making the break away at the 55k mark I fell back out of it on a climb pretty quickly after not recovering from going across. I was a little disapointed but hoped to make up for it. The break seemed to stay at around 1-2mins through out the rest of the race. As we came to the final 30k I got stuck in driving the front and attacking hard to try getaway for a top 10. I managed to get clear in the final K with 4 others and clawed through to tenth place. Pretty pleased after a long tough race and form seems to be on good track for the up coming club road Nationals in a few weeks. This was a realy great event and I recomend it for anyone keen for a good challenge next year. Kerri-anne hada great race rolling in 29th overall in the 2nd bunch and first women. Shes on track for a good ride at the nationals and is training hard. Also young William Green who I have been coaching this year hada great ride in the Rotorua CRI junior tour getting stuck in and coming away with some good results for a first year U17. Hes looking good for the next few years and will be one to watch Josh