London and South East CX League Rd #9 Redbridge, 20 Nov 2022

My new team had asked for riders to come race at Hog Hill as they were putting the race. I had my covid jab the day before the race and had a really rough night, not being able to sleep and also felt sick in the morning and in the van all the way there so that wasn’t a great start. After scouting out the course it looked like not too muddy just slippy grass and then a couple tarmac sections including the infamous Hoggenberg (the steep hill on the Hog Hill circuit) however we were seeing very muddy bikes so assumed that there was a bad section at the bottom of the hill. I went for a warm up lap and was happy to find out there weren’t any hurdles and just a small set of steps. At the bottom of the circuit where the water was collecting after a rainy weekend there were some barely rideable sections including one which you went from doing 15-20mph on the tarmac onto deep liquid mud, and there was a slight drop so holding the bike up there was a challenge. During the race I managed to keep it up each time and ride through that section although running it seemed to be just as fast if you wanted to be knee deep in mud. There were a few hills which suited me as I’m a lighter more powerful rider, I just lack technical ability. The course was mainly just wet muddy and slippy which I managed to deal pretty well with.

There were 45 in the race and I was gridded 42nd. The whistle went and I had to try to clip in about 3/4 times, a gap of about 10 meters opened up between me and the back of the sprinting pack. The grid was on a flat section of tarmac that soon bent round to the left and was then about 300m of steep hill up to the finish line then onto the grass. I managed to catch the back riders again by the corner and used my power to push up about 15 places on the hill putting me in a slightly better position. Due to the hilly and then narrowness of the course the 45 rider pack immediately became a long line and I found myself losing contact with the rest of the riders. Throughout the race I pushed as hard as I could on the sections that suited me, got better at the technical areas each lap and managed to keep moving forwards overtaking people one by one.

The race was supposed to be 45 minutes, however I came through the finish line about 40 ish mins in and the leaders came in about 5 mins later so everyone after that was stopped but I had to do another lap and seeing as the laps were 12 mins long I ended up slogging out another lap after thinking I was done. There was one downhill section where we went on two mountain bike ‘u turn berms’ which were quite fun, however, on the last lap I came out of one a little too hot and too far to the right where the ground dipped down and the bike slipped from under me. I came down quite heavily and bashed my knee which I was more annoyed about then actually in pain but it did bleed and was bruised. I got overtaken by one guy but got back up and carried on attempting to chase him down, I managed to get closer to him with about a quarter of the lap left.

On another section there is a u turn on the muddiest bit to the tarmac. I always hugged the tape here as it was the least muddy line and it was fine every time however this time I got the course tape stuck in my chain as soon after that when attempting to clip in, my cleats were full of mud so it took a while to clip in and once I had and tried to pedal the cranks just span round. I looked down and my cassette and derailleur were wrapped in tape. I got off and started attempting to rip the tape off but it was tightly wrapped round, the chain had fallen in between the smallest cog and the frame and was jammed by the tape. After about 4 minutes of very frustrating yanking and watching everyone ride past i eventually got back on the bike and sprinted up the hill as the last finisher. As I crossed the line I had an overwhelming rush of guilt and frustration that all that work and effort I’d put in went to waste but things happen so I didn’t let it get to me. Thankfully as some people had been lapped they got pulled a lap early so I finished 27th in the end instead of what should’ve been about 15th from 45th. Anyway this shows good progress and as my 4th cross race ever I’m pretty happy with the effort I put in and how I performed.

Chris King