On the Trails with Peter Disera: September 2013

The 2013 Mountain Bike World Championships were held in Pietermaritzberg, South Africa - incase you didn't know already!

What did that mean? That meant 33.5 hours gate to gate, or 42 hours door to door travelling. Exciting stuff. Luckily for us the travelling went about as smoothly as it could have. No delays, cancellations, lost bags or headaches - with minor exceptions.

When I arrived in South Africa the first thing I noticed was barbed wire. There was barbed wire everywhere. It was around everything, on almost every fence and most definitely around every nice property. The airport itself looked like a Canadian prison. However, even with all of this scenery, all of the locals that I talked to were animate that it's a safe place! Their disclaimers were: don't go out after dark, don't carry large amounts of money or have good looking jewelry on. Seemed simple enough!

After arriving at the hotel, which is behind a spiky fence with a guarded entrance, we moved into our rooms. Our rooms were small and we quickly filled them. Food wasn't an issue as there was a mall next to the hotel. The mall had a Wollies and a bunch of restaurants to eat at. Food is quite cheap down in these parts. Dinner out for 7 people came to just under 600 RAND. Which is $60. That's a pretty solid meal!

Nice spin with the team eh?

Now I know what you're thinking regarding all the barbed wire and guards; but Pietermaritzberg is quite safe. I decided to do some research as I was concerned, only a small, insignificant amount, but still the same I was curious. What I learned was horrifying, and thus statistics that I found will not be expanded upon, but what I also found was a map. This map outlined where all the 'bad things' happened. Pietermaritzberg? Not a single 'bad thing' - except for large income inequality - so rest assured that all is good!

Shortly after we arrived there was a team safari. This was a must attend simply because we're in Africa and you safari in Africa. What a fantastic experience this was. We saw lots of zebra and ostriches. Then the hippos made their appearance and we may or may not have chased a rhino into the pond in the rover. When in Rome! - or Africa...

Ok. Moving on to the juicy stuff for all those cyclist people out there.

The course:

The World Championships course was excellent. This was an elements course - super fast, cruisy, flowy hard packed trails and man made elements thrown in to test some skills. The hard packed clay trails made for some smooth sailing. As the week went on, however, the crust began to break away and mass amounts of poofy dust came up. It was like hitting powder on skis. The technical sections on course were skill testing, but more so nerve testing. I recall on my first day of pre-riding asking myself why I came to South Africa. I was so scared of some of the elements. In my eyes there were three elements that posed a threat: the 'Rapid Rocks' (first rock garden), 'Sharkas Playground' (log drops), and 'Tree House' (long rock garden). Rapid Rocks was relatively easy in hind sight. This was a short set of rocks with some distinctive lines through. I would like to point out the line that I chose to ride - the line that everyone told me was garbage and slow - was also the same line that Niño rode in his race. Boom! Sharkas Playground occurred about half way down the Amphitheatre. This is where the course builders had taken some trees, placed them in the side of a hill, built a berm at the bottom and said go! This was terrifying to look at. The thought of falling 10 feet or more on to my head was not so pleasant. I stood there looking at this feature for about 10 minutes. For that entire duration my heart rate did not go below 155 bpm. As I watched some of the U23 women do I decided I needed to try it. Just as I thought, I was fine... It was easy. I was way too stressed that first day of pre-riding. The next feature - possibly the most difficult on course - was the Tree House rock garden. This was a lot steeper in person than on Red Bull TV. Not to mention the rocks were big and awkwardly placed. It was all about bombing in, staying upright, make the turn at the bottom and carry good speed. This was thrilling. Other important parts of the course were the switchback climbs off the start, the long sustained climb up to the Ampitheatre, the drop/hip jump before Sharkas Playground and the Corkscrew (this was a cool set of berms and drops). These parts will be refered to later.

Sharkas Playground

Rapid Rocks

Base of Sharkas Playground

Amphitheatre

Amphitheatre (other side)

Cork Screw

Tree House Rock Garden

The race:

Here's your meat and potatoes of the blog. Hope you enjoy.

Ok race time. Well I felt like crap... Before the race barfing was almost a reality. I was so nervous. I was concerned I hadn't tuned my body properly and that I wasn't going to be able to preform. The amount of nerves reminded me of a race from early this year. That race was the ITT. I felt sick for that race too and I didn't know why I was so nervous and that's when Alex Sanna of SRS said to me "You're nervous because you know you can win". On the start line of world championships that is what I thought about. The only reason as to why I felt so nervous was because I knew I could do well. I felt it. So I believed it. I embraced that feeling and calmed right down. This was another race, and like any other race I was gunning for the top of the podium.

The start was as any other junior start is: fast, elbows out and crashes. I tried to stay out of trouble and not waste any energy that wasn't necessary. Hitting the first set of switchbacks I ended up locking bars with another rider and having to run the first hill. However, by the end of the 1st lap I had made my way up into the top ten. This was good. Another half lap later I was top 5. This was right where I needed to be. I rode the next 2.5 laps with two other riders. One rider was German and the other rider started as a Czech rider but he was dropped and replaced by an Italian. The group of us were competing for the last spot on the podium until a French rider ahead got a flat. The game was now on for 2nd, 3rd or 4th.

On the steep climbs I was getting gapped slightly because I didn't want to go over the top and get counter attacked. I would catch back on during flat sections or downhills. Half way through the 4th lap of 5, as the German rode the drop and was about to hit the hip he laid the bike over. I passed him there and got a gap. Pinning it on the downhill I realized I was alone. This was good as I was now 2nd and riding by myself. I was in control. Pinning it for the last lap I gained almost nothing on the 2013 World Champion. Realizing this at the top of the Ampitheatre I decided to chill out and ride safe. Bring it home. And that's exactly what I did. 2nd at World Championships!