WMBC Club member Josh Carlson reports on the National XC Championships held at Mt Stromlo, Canberra on the Australia Day weekend in 2009. 

The Australian mountain bike championships has come and gone and the new champions have been crowned. Surprise surprise, there was some strange weather to greet us again but this time it was expected but how it was delivered was the surprise. 

Australia day long weekend was the date which the aussie champs was held, at Canberra’s Mt. Stromlo 'moonscape' course. This years cross country course a very similar course to that of the world cup course used in August. It had the leg exploding 'cardiac climb', hammer head descent and the fast flowing, knargly remainder of the course that kept me on my toes for the entire 2 hr 30 race. The weather was typically hot but Sunday morning started out nice and cool. Cool enough for a jumper until lunchtime. Everyone was stoked with the cool weather. This lasted until 1pm(1.30pm race start) when the heat kicked in and tried to make up for lost sunburn straight away, with the temp's climbing to around 35 deg just in time for our race. 

I started out off the third row but soon got blown out the back with the intense pace that was being held up front due to everyone trying to the singletrack first. I started off the race way down the field but made my way back through the field on the rest of the technical, downhill sections.

Once i got back through for the next lap, all the positions i made up on the rest of the track, i would soon lose on the long draggy fire road climb leading up to 'cardiac climb'. My legs were already blowing up and there was still 4 laps to go. Not good!! I continued to struggle up the climbs and push my hardest on the rest of the track to make up lost ground again. And once again I would lose all of those places on the fire road again. This was frustrating with several riders and me passing each other nearly every lap until the end. I pushed as hard as i could and gave everything i had left (which wasn't very much by the end of the race!) and rolled across the line in 29th. A little bit disappointed with my final result but happy i finished and left everything out on the track. 

Round 4 of the aussie series was the following weekend, and was held at Mt Buller, Victoria. Bit of altitude and a bit of a heat wave across Melbourne was just what the doctor ordered after an horrendously hard race at Canberra! We were greeted with temps around 44+ degrees at the bottom of the mountain and mid 30's at the top at the ski resort.

The track was super hard and surprisingly technical with some extremely hard climbs and knargly rocky descents. 5 laps was the order and lap times were expected between the 25-30 min mark. Oh and of course it was the hottest day in Mt Buller history with 35 being the temp for our 1pm race start!! I started this race inside the top ten for the first two laps and was feeling super strong and comfortable on the track that was rapidly deteriorating and turning every rider into dusty black dust covered animals, until once again i blew up on the stupidly steep fire road climb on the third lap that brought us up to the finish. (This hill was so steep i would nearly vomit when i reached the top every lap and several top riders blew so hard, they could barely walk up it!) 

I started riding backwards for the remainder of the race, still pushing as hard as i could and attacking every section but unable to make an impression on moving up in the places. My legs were gone and the track had been so smashed up that a tight knargly, technical climb mid lap was so chewed out that many riders were forced to walk up it due to it practically being unrideable. I finished up placing 20th. Better than last week, but still not where i wanted to be. This placed me in equal 11th in the series points, leading up to the final round held at Glenorchy in Tasmania on the 28th/1st march. 

Two super hard weekends of racing and a whole heap of knowledge learnt from both races about my entire seasons racing, training, preparing, myself and body and now back to the hard training days to prepare for the last national round and the fast approaching Oceania Mountain bike Championships in march at Thredbo on the 21/22nd. 

Lots of riding and training from fennerstotalperformance.com training is on the cards for the next few weeks to try and re-ignite the fitness i seemed to have lost from lots of racing travelling. Lots of hurt and a bit fun to be had and looking forward to a strong ride in Hobart. Till the next report, i hope to see you all at a club round soon. Till then, ride lots and ride safe!! 

Josh Carlson.
Wollongong Mountain Bike Club Member