It's a fine line....

...between pleasure and pain, so they say. And so it was that I experienced both sensations this morning at the HMBA club race. This was my first MTB race for the year, and my first crack at the club's new graded system. No more just racing the old blokes! I chose to ride B grade, and the pace was on from the get-go, and soon a train of six riders started to pull away. I sat and bided my time, thinking they couldn't keep it up for four 7.5km laps. Pauly McLean got away on the 2nd lap, and I rode with some guy and Scotty until the climb on the 3rd lap, when a bit of an effort put Scotty in trouble. There were guys falling off left, right and centre, and soon I found myself sitting in third. I managed to crash 4 times on the 3rd and 4th laps (see photo above), but was able to stay with old mate, then we were joined by Dan Weekes, who had charged back up the field after leading early. Another attack up the last climb and Dan and I rid ourselves of the Cannondale guy, and we had Pauly in sight. Coming into the tight, technical section about 1.5km from the finish, my front tyre rolled of the rim and it was game over for my planned challenge for 2nd as I was thrown into the gully! I ran and rode on the rim to the line, being passed by 4 riders to finish in 6th. I was pretty happy with my ride though, showed pretty good pace and the endurance was fine. Maybe the road racing is paying off a bit. But it's disappointing to have a podium wrapped up and for a mechanical to wipe you out, but I guess, as they say (who ARE they, anyway?), that's racing...