Hopefully i'll be more Marty Allen than Fabian Polchow if you get my drift..
http://www.mtbcrossmaraton.pl/m/zagnansk_22-lipca-2012
Poland mtb Marathon
Poland mtb Marathon
Well i'm going to keep the international flag flying for Racing795 this Sunday and have a go at a local marathon. 57km, looks handy enough..
Hopefully i'll be more Marty Allen than Fabian Polchow if you get my drift..
http://www.mtbcrossmaraton.pl/m/zagnansk_22-lipca-2012
Hopefully i'll be more Marty Allen than Fabian Polchow if you get my drift..
http://www.mtbcrossmaraton.pl/m/zagnansk_22-lipca-2012
Re: Poland mtb Marathon
The very best of luck David, delighted to see someone on the International scene along of course with Tom. Enjoy the break as well. Are Junior Furlongs tagging along for the support?
Re: Poland mtb Marathon
cheers Don.
All Furlongs present, ties in with another camping adventure..
All Furlongs present, ties in with another camping adventure..
Re: Poland mtb Marathon
Hope you get loads of gasps again from the crowd as the skilful irishman on an mtb 
Re: Poland mtb Marathon
More like the mad Irishman
Good luck
Good luck
Re: Poland mtb Marathon
Good luck. looking forward to report and photos
Re: Poland mtb Marathon
Any word from the most skillful Irishman in Zagnańsk?
Re: Poland mtb Marathon
'allez les goobers'
Report coming soon..
Report coming soon..
Re: Poland mtb Marathon
Well now.
I,ll start at the end, 52 km covered in 2 1/2 hrs, definitely the fastest mtb race I,ve ever done.
Arrived at the race start, a rural village in mid-Poland called Zagnansk. I was accompanied by the gang as co-incidentally there was a nice campsite a few kms from the race venue..funny coincidence that...
This race was part of a series all around this area. It's largely flat so wasnt expecting anything technical. I elected for the 50km distance which is for all comers. There is a longer distance but that's for the pros..about 200 in my race. Weather was beautiful, about 23 degrees and sunny
The start was a shock to the system - haven't done a race in a while, and it's always a shock when you're off the start line and at 95% hr straight away. So a couple of k on the road and then about 5 k of cobblestones, and loose gravel. Think a flat Black Banks,hard going. More k,s of fire road and before I know it we,ve covered 15 k at an average speed of 28kph..!! Can't keep up this pace says I ( but I,ll try). Thankfully we soon got into some nice single track , flowy stuff through the forest. Then out into some fields lots of ,roller coaster, stuff, making up place like no tomorrow. Got to the feed then at 29k feeling good. Soon after then we had about 10k of long straight gravelly climbs. Gravel road as far as the eye can see. Feeling a bit dead at this stage so stuffed a bar into me and drafted as good as I could. After 45k then into some really nice single track climbing through the woods, bit like going up the lower wood for 5 k. Then a bit of road to finish.
No idea where I finished, no results yet.happy enough though as I pushed hard. Enjoyable day out, as I,ve said before not every mtb race needs to be full of scary drops and hard technical riding to be fun...this was something different - and believe me flaking down a loose gravel road at 50kph is every bit as scary...
Great organization, tenner to enter, race started bang on time, bowl of polski bolognese at the finish, what more do you want.
And of course frank the obligatory story...so I'm flying through the woods, there's a guy about 50m in front of me. This section has lots of little dips and holes to get through. Eeezy peezy for an expert like me
pump your way or bunny hop over if you're feeling confident. Anyways my polski friend obviously wasn't blessed with the same silky skills. So I hear a squawk, look up to see mr polski airborne. As I approach he,s gesticulating furiously saying something like...,watch out there's an impossible technical feature here, please dismount your bike to avoid serious injury,....so I bunny hops over - nonchalantly of course - to be greeting by an ,ooooooohh, of admiration...amazing how something like that can immediately energies you...
Some things I learned:
Draft at every available opportunity
Stay in the big ring even when you feel you can't
Hardtail + mtb marathon = sore back
Camping the night before with the wife and kids may not be the ideal race preparation
the ole knees aint what they used to be
thanks to Joy and the kids for cheering me on..
Do widzenia ...
I,ll start at the end, 52 km covered in 2 1/2 hrs, definitely the fastest mtb race I,ve ever done.
Arrived at the race start, a rural village in mid-Poland called Zagnansk. I was accompanied by the gang as co-incidentally there was a nice campsite a few kms from the race venue..funny coincidence that...
This race was part of a series all around this area. It's largely flat so wasnt expecting anything technical. I elected for the 50km distance which is for all comers. There is a longer distance but that's for the pros..about 200 in my race. Weather was beautiful, about 23 degrees and sunny
The start was a shock to the system - haven't done a race in a while, and it's always a shock when you're off the start line and at 95% hr straight away. So a couple of k on the road and then about 5 k of cobblestones, and loose gravel. Think a flat Black Banks,hard going. More k,s of fire road and before I know it we,ve covered 15 k at an average speed of 28kph..!! Can't keep up this pace says I ( but I,ll try). Thankfully we soon got into some nice single track , flowy stuff through the forest. Then out into some fields lots of ,roller coaster, stuff, making up place like no tomorrow. Got to the feed then at 29k feeling good. Soon after then we had about 10k of long straight gravelly climbs. Gravel road as far as the eye can see. Feeling a bit dead at this stage so stuffed a bar into me and drafted as good as I could. After 45k then into some really nice single track climbing through the woods, bit like going up the lower wood for 5 k. Then a bit of road to finish.
No idea where I finished, no results yet.happy enough though as I pushed hard. Enjoyable day out, as I,ve said before not every mtb race needs to be full of scary drops and hard technical riding to be fun...this was something different - and believe me flaking down a loose gravel road at 50kph is every bit as scary...
Great organization, tenner to enter, race started bang on time, bowl of polski bolognese at the finish, what more do you want.
And of course frank the obligatory story...so I'm flying through the woods, there's a guy about 50m in front of me. This section has lots of little dips and holes to get through. Eeezy peezy for an expert like me
pump your way or bunny hop over if you're feeling confident. Anyways my polski friend obviously wasn't blessed with the same silky skills. So I hear a squawk, look up to see mr polski airborne. As I approach he,s gesticulating furiously saying something like...,watch out there's an impossible technical feature here, please dismount your bike to avoid serious injury,....so I bunny hops over - nonchalantly of course - to be greeting by an ,ooooooohh, of admiration...amazing how something like that can immediately energies you... Some things I learned:
Draft at every available opportunity
Stay in the big ring even when you feel you can't
Hardtail + mtb marathon = sore back
Camping the night before with the wife and kids may not be the ideal race preparation
the ole knees aint what they used to be
thanks to Joy and the kids for cheering me on..
Do widzenia ...
Re: Poland mtb Marathon
... change positionDavidF wrote:Camping the night before with the wife and kids may not be the ideal race preparation
the ole knees aint what they used to be
Anyway, 28kph on an mtb, you should bring the hardtail on our road spins!