//words by Jay Williamson
//pics by Ian Lean
South west champs is always a favourite of mine. Each year Chaz Lamley and co brew up some great racing and great atmosphere. This year was the same recipe, but with a slight twist, it was set at Woodlands rather than the usual Gawton.
To spice it up even further, Chaz made the event a stage race. That meant two downhill tracks to be raced, one on Saturday and one on Sunday and a alttle extra challenge for all. It meant four race runs, two on each with times combined!
The first track to be raced was the ‘Avalanche’ track that we soon found out involved a lot of pedaling! You had to be on the gas all the way down and with it being a sub-one-minute run it felt like you never stopped turning the cranks all the way down! That one hurt a lot – there was no point that you could you relax and carry speed and you knew that you where searching for hundredths of a second anywhere on track you could find it!
At the end of the Avalanche I got a bit of a shock and found Welsh junior rider Shaun Richards sitting in first place by just over a second, that’s a lot of time on these tracks. I must admit this left me scratching my head, but with second races coming up it was still all to play for across the field! I pulled some time back on my second run but not enough and Shaun ended Saturday sitting in first overall, 0.3 up.
Sunday’s race was different. It was a fair bit steeper, more technical and very tight and awkward making it a challenge to all riders. First runs kicked off and yet again Shaun had put in a good time, leading the field which got everyone talking and interested to see how the afternoon would unfold.
My first race run of the day was a good one. I felt good on track and really rode hard to give myself a healthy 2 second lead. That felt great but I knew that there was a few people that where not going down without a fight, so it was all down to the second runs.
So it came down to final runs and as the track was drying up the riders where getting more confident. I’ll admit, my last run of the day was not pleasant and I went out the gate knowing that anyone could take it. I went for it, really pushing every bit of the track and ended up getting pretty dam loose. I crossed the line knowing that the run got pretty out of hand d to find that I had managed to improve on my time.
With the results added up and 4 race runs in I was stoked to take the overall win at the South West Champs title. It was a great battle with Shaun all weekend and Chaz put on a great event. Thanks to him and to everyone else that put on a great weekend of racing!
