one month

I just realised im just over one month from flying out for another season of madness and riding bikes.
The last few weeks have been flat out with the NZ Open being held in Christchurch and then the weekend after we had the Oceania Championships here in Nelson.
The NZ Open was a pretty cool race, it was held completely independantly from bikeNZ so there were no commasaires to deal with and it was all pretty laid back, there was even some pretty decent(for NZ) prize money up for grabs. The race was held on the legendary Lava Flow track which is basically run down a open grass hill with no trees but a LOT of volcanic rock which isnt too nice to crash on. The course was taped well leaving a lot of room to get some new lines happening which made practice fun. I qualified 3rd behind Yeti Factory riders Justin Leov and Sam Blenkinsop with Cam Cole right behind me in 4th so it was going to be a pretty tight final.
By the time we got up the hill for finals there was a massive wind blowing straight across the hill which made some parts a little dodgy and some of them grueling trying to sprint into the wind. I had a fairly tidy run and came through the line slotting into 2nd with a 2.26.58 just .51 of a second down on cams time. The 2.26 mark proved to be popular with Sam Blenkinsop coming in with a 2.26.14 knocking me back to 3rd. I just managed to hold of Nathan Sharrat who also came through on a 2.26.97.
Although it was going to be Justin Leov's race as he came through the last section super smooth and stopped the clock with a 2.22.86 schooling us all!

The Oceania Championships were almost the complete oposite to what the NZ Open was, we were back to having to deal with power hungry commasiaires wanting to take you down a peg anytime they could.
Having ridden the track a bit before and also still trying to deal with an injured ankle which doesnt want to heal I decided to sit out the first days practice and help get the 4x gate set up that I had built. Day 2 of practice also had qualifying in the afternoon so I had to get a couple of runs in before then, the track was in prime condition with most of the corners holding together pretty well.
My qualifying run was going really well hitting everything clean and carrying some good speed untill about 3 corners from the bottom I got a rear flat and things got out of control! Comingh round the last corner into the finishing double I got a huge drift on and almost looped out, managing to hold on and grovel across the line I came through 3rd again behind the two Yeti Factory riders Sam and Justin, the times were all pretty close so I was feeling confident for the race.
My race run was fast but conservative in some places, I knew there would be some corners almost completely gone by the time I raced as there had been about 200 people down the track since I had last seen it.
As I came though the line I saw Nathan Rankins time of 2.57.48 on the board just before mine came up, I knew it was going to be a hard time to beat and as my time started scrolling aross the board i saw the 2.57 and it seemed like a long time before the .06 1st place came up. I was happy that I was definately going to get a medal but I didnt want to get too excited as Justin and Sam were still comewhere on the hill.
Justin came through the line and slipped into 2nd with a 2.57.20, I was stoked to hold off Justin because he is a really hard worker and is always on the gas. But there was still Sam on the hill and you can never count him out, especially after he had qualified 1st and was looking really comfortable on his new bike. Looking through the trees though it looked like he was cruising and when he came through the line I could see why, he had a massive crash near the top of his run and twisted his bars which would of made the rest of the run horrible.
But with this I realised I had just won my first Oceania Championships! Its a big race and there was some tough compeition to beat with valuable UCI points on the line.

Bring on the international season!

what? an update!

Yes im back again, to make it 3 blog posts all in 3 different years!

This time im actually going to try keep it updated, thats if theres anyone who actually checks this page?!?! Were well into the summer in NZ and weve just finished the South Island DH cup, I ended up 5th in pro after crashing at every round, the round in Nelson on my home track was going good. I qualified 2 seconds up on Justin Leov then managed to some how loop out over the bars 2 corners from the finish, i still pulled 4th and got some cash so it wasnt all bad. The highlight was winning a pro invitational race in Queenstown and walking away with $200.









Supercross has started in the US and being a mental moto fan ive been keeping a pretty tight watch on whats going with that, my favourite riders are on the pipe, #22 Chad Reed has won all but one round where he got 2nd and he is pretty much running away with the points lead. And the #338 of Jason Lawrence finally pulled his first win in San Fransisco in the mud then going on to win Anaheim 3 last weekend, hes only a few points behind Dungey for the overall so heres hoping he holds it together.

Ive pretty much got my plans all set for the US season, I just found out I got accepted for a scholaship from the Adastra foundation so thats gonna be a big help to the finances, ive also signed a few sponsors in the US to help me out this year so its looking good.

bloggin

I just remembered I had a blog so I guess I should try updating it for the first time in well over a year.
Last weekend was the 2nd to last round of the NORBA series here in the US and I finally got my first podium, 2nd place only 0.33 of a second away from win which was a little disappointing but a podium is still good. This has put me up into 5th overall for the series currently which im stoked with so hopefully ill be able to stay in the top 5 at the end.
Ive had a few ups and downs this summer in the us, a 7th place at Angel Fire with a crash was an example of both, a top 10 was good but know i could of been on the podium was a disapointment again. Deer Valley was similar, after qualifying 10th with a pretty stacked field I knew I could make up time but in the final I crashed and snapped my fork through the arch so that ruined my race run and also lost me a lot of valuable points for the overall.

With one race to go in the norba series then world champs its almost time to return home to NZ and have a break from racing which im looking forward to.

whats going on?

So here I am 3 days out from leaving NZ for the USA and im wondering how i can keep people in the know of what im up to.... a blog, good idea.

whats been going on? weve finished the NZ season for 06 and now everyone is either over seas or very close to going.
I finished the NZ season a high being the highest placed kiwi pro at the oceania champs in rotorua coming in 5th for the race and 3rd for oceanias and also slotting into 4th place overall for the NZ national series.

The oceania champs were awesome being on the track that is being used for the world champs this year, most people spent the week leading up in rotovegas riding in the forest and at the bmx track to fill in the time, all the junior boys were causing havoc at the Ibis hotel, mainly ashley potts.....

by the time the race rolled around there were quite a few international riders, cedric and Fabien had made the trip from france to check out the track and a few of the aussie boys came over.
Cameron Cole and Sam Blenkinschnozzle my competition from juniors last year showed the aussie juniors whats up coming in 1-2 and both of them having top 5 pro times! watch out for these boys at worlds!!

Fabien took out pro with sam hill, cedric gracia and mic hannah in beind then me following up in 5th.