Highlander... lots of words, not enough pictures!!

Time for another weekend road trip to the 80km “Highlander” mtb marathon.  With the cancellation of the Moonride in February I felt the need for some ‘event practice’ to try and get my brain used to being in ‘event mode’ – and a really good excuse to spend the weekend riding in Rotorua!

I didn’t have a great start to the weekend,  with Friday being a ‘scared’ day and generally finding trail alligators in all sorts of unexpected places.  Cue much frustration and cursing, but, eventually I managed to clear most of my ‘trouble spots’ with help from my poor, long-suffering and incredibly patient husband! 

Saturday was a totally different experience.   All of the trail alligators appeared to have left town for the day and I flowed over Friday’s trouble spots and couldn’t resist the odd “YUSS!!” out loud in a couple of spots.  I love days like this – feels like I’m truly at one with the bike, rolling over roots and flowing around tight corners as if I know what I’m doing.  I spend the rest of the day relaxing in the sun and catching up/chilling out with friends.  Scarily enough I was feeling (relatively) confident and relaxed about the race, looking forward to getting out and destroying myself on some fantastic trails.

Then on Saturday night it rained.  Then rained some more. Even more rain early on Sunday morning.  I know this because I was awake the entire night – I didn’t think that I was overly worried, just could not get comfortable and every time I started to drift off I thought “yay, sleep!” – Which promptly pushed me wide awake again!  I dragged myself out of the suddenly very comfortable bed, stuffed down some breakfast and pedalled off to the forest early enough for a coffee and a bit of chit-chat before the start.  The start list was surprisingly short – only 20 people entered for the full distance (plus the elites taking part in the Marathon Champs). At least I wouldn’t have to worry about getting in too many people’s way.

Both rain and ‘events’ increase my anxiety and decrease the level of confidence I have in my ability to ride my bike – combine the two and the effect is magnified x 100!  I know perfectly well that it’s not rational, but rational thoughts tend to get buried under the onslaught of unhelpful anxious thoughts.

I was fairly near the back of the start loop, mistakenly not passing a single speeder in the open, so had to sit behind him until the coast was clear (probably cost me all of 5 seconds to be honest!) by which time the rest of the field had disappeared in to the distance.  I rolled fairly happily through the first part of Rockdrop and on in to Genesis, where all was good until I fluffed an uphill switchback and ended up upside down under my bike having heard a nasty scraping noise.  Scrambling back up I noticed that my seat was now pointing nose down – not seriously, but not flat, either!   Oh, well – SIUP (suck it up, princess) and carry on up down, round and around through Soakhole, then in to the lovely A-Trail.  The entrance had gotten a little cut up, but I bounced down it fine and proceeded to grin stupidly – I’d forgotten how much I love this trail.  From here it was up – up Tickler, Up Direct Rd, up Frontal Lobotomy – which was actually riding pretty nicely – then up to Billy T.  This has been a ‘bogey’ trail of mine in the past and I was a bit apprehensive about how wet it would be.   I needn’t have worried (as usual!) – The trail was fine, with only a couple of silly mistakes.  Then it was up, up, up again to Split Enz, which is always worth the climb – lovely, flowy swoopy goodness.  Off around the lake through some fairly overgrown sections (mostly at short person head-height), twice past the friendly marshals at the drink station, then up again to No Brains.  I’ve ridden this trail before, but today wasn’t going to be a repeat. I spent far too much time walking – even down the section that Shane had hiked in to take photos of!!  Annoyingly, it was all rideable – even by me – but my stupid brain just kept saying “no”.    I did manage to not get too upset and just carry on, accepting the lack of mojo.  At this point the rain gods got serious and decided to make up for the dryness of the past few weeks with some serious water falling from the sky.  I came to a nice hike-a-bike section – rideable by mountain goats, possibly – then on to Pondy New  (a very appropriate name given the amount of water around).  The rain seemed to be washing away what was left of my confidence, I was balking on sections that I can (and have) ridden in my sleep!  Lion trail was a giant river, Grinder was sloppily messy in places and the final trail, Rosebank, had plenty of paddling pools had I felt like stopping to play.  I stomped through the water splash and headed for home – at least the finish flags were still out – thanks Ra! – although prize giving was well and truly over and most of the competitors had packed up and gone home.   I haven’t missed prizegiving by that much for quite a while and it can be quite disheartening, especially when you were hoping to prove to yourself just how much you’d improved.

Photo: CYCL1N

Overall, I enjoyed being out on my bike for the day, but I’m pretty disappointed with the outcome.  I’m never going to have the engine to go fast – but I’d hoped to be able to give a lot more(physically and mentally) at this race… turns out I just didn’t have it to give.

I’ve had numerous attempts at tackling the anxiety and lack of confidence that I have both in general and on the bike.  Sometimes you beat the monsters and sometimes you’ve just got to deal with them.  I’m not giving up on beating the little buggers, just trying not to waste time and energy getting upset when they get the better of me… and keep remembering how lucky I am to be able to get out and ride in such fantastic places with some pretty amazing people.