IXS European Cup #4 - Wiriehorn

After two consecutive races with mechanicals, all I was hoping for going into Wiriehorn was to have a clean race run. Straight after Ilmenau we went to Christian Textor's place. Christian is a good friend and top German rider, and has some really good riding right in his area. We got to ride some dirt jumps, do some flips into a foam pit, shred pump track and send some massive downhill jumps. After a week of riding almost every type of bike, it was time to get back into race mode for Wiriehorn.

After my pedal mishap in Ilmenau, I decided to change pedals. I was really battling to stay clipped in during practice on Friday and Saturday. I thought it was just because I wasn't used to the pedals yet, but after I uncleated a number of times, one time right before a big jump, during my seeding run, I had to change something. I put new cleats on my shoes that evening, and straight away felt better during Sundays practice - I still don't know what the problem was with the other cleats because they were also brand new. My seeding run obviously wasn't that good due to all of my problems. I seeded 38th.

My practice runs on Sunday went a lot better because I actually felt confident that my feet would stay on the pedals. I didn't make any costly mistakes during my finals run, but as I rode sections I knew that I should and could be hitting them faster. As a whole I had a very mediocre run, which reflected in my result. I finished 37th which is far from what I was hoping for. I think spending some time is Morzine, just riding, chilling and training will really do me some good as I have been getting pretty frustrated with all of my bad luck with regard to mechanicals and my race run in Wiriehorn.

I am really looking forward to tackling my last 4 races here the best I can.