Descent-gear clipped in at Moelfre had a classic British race storyline with the non stop downpours on Friday, sending away even the toughest racers.
Saturday looked hopeful with early sunshine, but the clouds constantly loomed over the vulnerable open hillside.
By some miracle, on Sunday the clouds parted leaving us draped in sunshine, turning the thick mud and sludge into dust. The tyres got swapped and the speed picked up.
It was my first time at Moelfre so I can’t comment on past tracks, but this time round, you set off from the usual start, heading into the quarry (No hucking this weekend) whilst almost getting blown backwards by mother nature, a few flat out turns into a couple of fades, then a quick two switchbacks setting you up for the first jumps on course.
After this you hit the infamous switchbacks, sending you back and forth across the hill. These got real beaten up by the end, but if you looked close enough there was more than a few lines to be had.
Into the double step down, did you have the balls to double it up? Smash through the braking bumps on landing and G-out across the road.
Now the burn begins, keeping it straight and low across the traverse, throwing in as many pedal strokes as possible. By the time 2nd runs came around the wind was howling up the valley making this a real lung buster. Round the corner heading into the final field, one last whooped out section, off the final kicker and into the big G-out, which unfortunately saw alot of carnage this weekend… Bit of a sketchy finish feature if you ask me.
Rumour had it all weekend that the Athertons were going to turn up… Dan was on the start sheet and Rachel had been seen riding on Saturday, but come race day Rachel cruised in to an unsuprising first place victory.
On to the racing and some fast times came in early, most noticeably from James Swinden, who took the Senior catergory with a 2:20:78. making him 6th fastest overall! Good work boyo.
The top 3 in the expert cat was seperated by less than a 1/3 of a second with Jack Graham coming out on-top for Sixpack racing. But the best performance of the weekend came from Matt Simmonds, racing on his proto Intense, coming in with a 2:12:84, nearly 4 seconds up on 2nd place.
All results are up here
Next up, the Welsh champs in Llangolen and the first round of the British downhill seris at Rheola!
Cheers to Scott and JoBo for getting this lot over to us!
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