Finding A Way Back Up

Sebastian Batchelor

• National Champs & European World Cups
• Turkish Nightmare
• First Racing
• A Tuscan Adventure
• Last Gasp Preparation

Things have been pretty busy over the last few weeks since I finally got back to the UK after my nightmare in Turkey. Unfortunately I am having a bit of a dry spell when it comes to good form, but I working on it and I hope to be back on the right track soon enough.

The weekend after I got back from Turkey was the first round of the UCI World Cup at Dalby Forest. I hadn’t exactly had ideal preparation leading in to it but I still felt rested and ready to go on race day. I had a measly grid position back in the 150’s, but despite not getting a bad start I didn’t have a great race and finished 132^nd.

The next two World Cups were frustratingly more of the same. Round two at Houffalize in Belgium turned in to a bit of a mud bath after some seriously heavy rain over night and on the morning before the race. This time with a 175 number board I came in 157^th. Last weekend was round three in Offenburg, Germany, which was funnily enough the opposite conditions of Houffalize, having been incredibly wet on the first practice day it was bone dry for the race on Sunday. Gradually moving back on the start grid due to the increasing number of competitors I only moved up 5 places from 185 to 180^th in the race.

In between Houffalize and Offenburg, I first had the second round of the British series at Wasing Park not far from Reading. This felt like another go at Sherwood Pines. Despite practicing well I finished 12^th, not a disaster but not nearly where I would like to be.

After the NPS I drove over to Italy to meet up with my team for a 4 day MTB stage race in Aosta. It was a very strange race that consisted of a TT round the town on the first day, a 27km XC day 2, 25km XC day 3 and finally a 22km race around the town to finish off. Everyday we met at the same town square (apart from the final day but the organisers decided not to tell the competitors this!) and would roll out to the start of the race, just like in a road race, apart from we would get to the course and then be gridded. It was a terribly organised race, but at least I got in four hard days of training!

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Hopefully I will find a solution to my ‘dead legs’ in races soon. Every athlete has their ups and downs, unfortunately I’m on a down at the moment but I can feel the up is just around the corner….