appreciate your back yard

Cait — Thu, 28 Jul 2011 19:45:51 +0000

Proper big mountains, hot weather that lasts all summer and not having to get on a plane every weekend to get a decent amount of competition in a race can make living in Europe look attractive but I haven’t left Ireland for a whole month and sometimes its good to appreciate what you have.

There are not many places you can live in walking distance of a big city centre but ride from your front door to mountains like these, which are rideable for 95% of the year. The variety of trails is amazing from woodland singletrack, to manmade trails, to big rocky open mountain tracks and with the bonus of plenty of other elite riders to go training with.

Its not just the mountains though, I have an increasing appreciation for the sea. You can swim in the sea without leaving the city, the water is even warm at the moment (17 degrees according to one of the enthusiastic locals!) and there is a whole Dublin subculture to be discovered down there with hardened old guys who swim everyday even when temperatures are below freezing in winter.

If only we had a bridge to Europe Dublin would be perfect.
Ok and a better economy too.

Biking Blitz Dublin

Cait — Mon, 09 May 2011 11:05:51 +0000

This weekend’s Biking Blitz race on Three Rock marked the opening of a new trail centre 20 minutes ride from my house in Dublin. It was a perfect, pressure free way to get back into racing after Spain and build some confidence before the big races start in a few weeks. I’m generally not a huge fan of manmade trails, but the new trails are set to be hugely beneficial for increasing awareness and participation in mountain biking, especially as they’re so close to Dublin. Providing you don’t ride them all the time, they can be a lot of fun, and their all-weather construction will be very useful in winter.

photo by Morgan O'Connell

I signed up for the 3 lap ‘racerhead’ category meaning I was racing all the elite s1 guys. After an official opening of the trails by government ministers and other VIPs, we set off with bang up a long hard climb, firstly tarmac and then singletrack. I was using the race as training and wanted to concentrate on having a fast start, this worked a bit too well as I launched myself into competing against the fast lads and got sucked into going bananas for the first lap, which of course wasn’t sustainable! I got into a good hard rhythm and already tired legs were soon burning with a blustery headwind making it more of a struggle (I hoped small hills would be easy compared to Spanish mountains – not so!). Once we made the top it was into an extremely fast long singletrack descent with plenty of rocky drops and swooping corners. The adrenaline was quickly flowing and I was pleased to remember how brilliant racing can be.

photo by Mike Wyley

Another climb, catching a few guys, and into another long descent, a really physically demanding trail that takes a lot of pedalling and upper body strength to ride fast. Luckily the faster you go the better it gets and I my legs felt like they had some good snap in them despite a lack of racing recently.

photo by Aine Conneff

Despite a bit of to-ing and fro-ing with a few of different guys, after the first lap the race very strung out and without a close battle to make me dig deep I couldn’t keep the pace going as we hit the climb a second time so had to slow down a bit. It seemed several people around me had also gone out too hard though so I wasn’t losing places. On the final descent I could see Mark of MAD closing in on me, I held him off until the bottom but he nipped passed as I struggled with slow gear changing before we turned uphill into a kicker before the finish. As he faltered on the kicker I tried to squeeze past but couldn’t get enough power in the short distance to the line so lost a place, grrrr!

photo by Aine Conneff

I finished 1st female and 15th overall (results here), winning a really cool trophy made out of a huge rock! Far too heavy for my jersey pocket so I had to find a lift home for it.

Thanks to Niall and Tarja from biking.ie for a brilliant, very well organised event. Fantastic to see racing so close to Dublin and getting so much recognition. Also thanks to Bart Felle for the feed zone support, Think Bike and WXC World Racing.

caitelliott.co.uk » mountain biking Dublin

appreciate your back yard

Biking Blitz Dublin