.

so my first bad race of the year went down in france over the weekend.everything leading up to the race went perfect and i feel like i got my taper just right with coach jeroen swarts help.i alo loved the course in labresse.it had a long sustained climb and a long technical descent.most days it was pretty slick out there too which caused a lot of pre race injuries.

we kicked off at our normal time slot of 2pm and as always the pace was crazy.i managed to get over the first climb in 5th and felt good as we setup for the first dh.this however would be where my weekend took a turn.i got rammed from behind and pushed of the track.stunned at first,i could get up.it took awhile for me to get back up to the trail and once i got going i realized my front tire had come off the rim.so i rolled down to the technical zone and changed a wheel.once i restarted i was pretty much last.i had to reset my goals for the day and just focus on scoring some points.the leaders were already a long way up the road.for the first two laps i think i walked most of the course.its crazy how congested it is at the back of the field.my legs were good though and i started picking off a lot of riders.i had a smooth race from there and by the end i managed to move up to 24th.satisfying as i must have been in the 120s on lap 1.

this week is even more exciting than the olympics for me.i get to marry the love of my life,cherise on saturday and enjoy some time off before the second half of the season starts,

ciao

burry

just ten days after arriving home from my last trip abroad it was time to pack my bags again and head for a small town 2hours from prague.nove mesto seems to be a small town nestled between big farms of yellow flowers-rape seeds i believe?

anyway the course here rocked last year and so for the 2012 edition we got to do the same track with some bmx jumps thrown in.these were great until i did a no footer in practice by mistake.i didn't get my feet back to those pedals so this meant i 5minute time out at the bottom of the trail...

except for that hiccup i had a pretty smooth week leading into the world cup.my bike setup was perfect and my body was feeling great.i was confident of having another strong race.

on sunday we kicked off at 2 10pm.not sure what the extra 10 minutes was for but it was.the start loop incorporated half of the normal loop and some long climbs,it was important to have good legs from the gun.i managed to stay in the top 5 the whole way round and soon we were a group of 6 off the front on the first lap.myself and teammate jaroslav made the split along with nino schurter,florian vogel,marco fontana and ralph naef. for the first few laps we had many riders attack and lead the race but ultimately the race came down to the last two laps.heading into the last lap it was myself,nino and jaroslav fighting for the win.i tried a small tactical attack on the pavement leading into the first climb but it was nino who countered and i just tried to hang on from there.it seemed like jaroslav had dropped off the pace as i kep trying to fight on nines wheel.on the last climb i thought i had something left until my legs said no.i had to let go and jaroslav got back and onto nine's wheel.i rolled in for third from there while jara had to settle for 2nd.

it was a great day out for the team as we won the team prize and i moved into 2nd place overall in the standings.jaroslav now sits in 3rd.

this week were in la bresse,france for the fourth round.should be another cracker!

ciao

burry