Ryan here
Thought I would put together a little report for you from National champs.
Practice. Practice went pretty well all weekend, bike went well, no problems. The track at mt Stromlo is not the best track around, but it is still fun, it was getting so blown out during practice, it was not funny, just started getting real loose, and before you know it your sideways in a corner with 2 feet on trying to not eat it, but fun haha.
Saturday. 4x.
The day started off well, was riding the lines I wanted to and was doing them pretty fast to my liking, I had the gate dialled which is the main thing in 4x. It was all going good till I got halfway through practice. as I was going down the 2nd last straight there is this kind of rhythm section, there is all different ways to hit it, but the fastest is jumping this little canyon thing, I had it done a few times, but went from the inside on one of the times and came up way to short and basically 5050d it and yeh the tyre just exploded haha.
Once I got that fixed I went back up to the track just to do some full runs and see what lines I could linkup. There is this fairly big kicky double on the third straight, there was a mad cross wind, and everyone was only hitting it from the outside turn, and the outside was just way to slow for my liking, so I thought I’d give it a go from the inside turn, it was all going well, cleared it easy but when I landed, I landed a tiny bit awkwardly and my deraliure tip just snapped straight off my bike, thank god it didn’t land in the wheel. Oh and it gave me yet another flat tyre haha! Once that happened I thought I was going to be in for a hard day of racing (mechanically).
By the time I got that fixed, it was time to race. I won my first heat easily, which boosted my confidence, then one after another I just kept winning all my heats, by a fair amount, in one race it was nearly 2 straights I had won by. Got to the semi finals, just kept doing what I was doing all day, riding my own race and keeping my head together, I ended up winning all my heats and my semi-final.
Then it came to the final, as I said in the semi, I just said to myself, run my own race, who cares who’s next to you, so that’s what I did, I held my head together, an I ended up winning the final by yet another good amount. I was happy to take out the 2009 national champion title in u19 men, felt good, just to be up on the podium and to be called the national champion! Was a pretty cool feeling.
Presentation was fun they gave us all champaine to spray, and I think I copped the worse of it haha.
Monday. DownHill.
Downhill was a different story, I felt so good all day through practice, I felt good the hole weekend, was doing the lines I wanted to do and I was happy with them, but then when it came to the final run, I don’t know what it was, I just felt weird, I went into the first rockgaden with a bit too much pace, got a little squrly but held it. Then all of a sudden I was riding way too conservative and braking in spots that I hadn’t been all weekend, was really weird. Didn’t end up to good with my result, only getting 20th, after qualifying 12th on a pretty cruisy run. But you know I guess that’s racing, and it’s all the name of the game, there’s always another race.
In the end it was a good weekend, especially being able to come home with a good result.
Ryan.
Congrats man... I know I speak for the Banshee crew thats pretty freekin' killer. Enjoy and taste the glory. It'll drive you onto bigger things
