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Welsh Cyclo-cross League.

Location: Pembrey, West Wales

Pembrey Cyclo-cross

On a very cold but glorious day I headed West on the M4 to Pembrey Country Park for a round of the Welsh Cyclo-cross league. The night before was fellow Wiggle team mate Lee Williams wedding which was not the best preparation before a race but you need to have some fun and a celebration like that is a great excuse. I had a nice drive along the M4 with clear traffic as you would expect on a Sunday and even had enough time to stop for a coffee to warm me up before the race.

Once I arrived at the venue it was clear it was going to be a dry race with the ground frozen solid which made some of simple corners a lot more technical. So after a few practice laps it was time to take off the thermals leaving me wearing a skinsuit and surprisingly I didn’t find it that cold although I had a few strange looks from people in leg warmers and arm warmers. I managed to get on the front row of the grid and was feeling good to get a good start.

Cross By The Sea

The whistle went and we were off flying across a frozen field and I was in a good position riding in second wheel behind Joe Lally. We then stayed as a pair at the front of the race increasing our lead every lap. The ground was starting to soften up due the rise in temperature from the sun and the corners were becoming quite greasy. At around three quarters of the way in to the race I made a couple of mistakes on the slippery corners and this gave the opportunity for Joe to gain an advantage over me. Unfortunately I was already on the limit racing around and didn’t have much more gas to give to take up the chase. I knew then it was going to be a second place finish for me even tough third place was gaining on m towards the end as I eased off to settle for second place.

Cross By The Sea

I really enjoyed the race and thought the course was really well thought out with a mixture of banks, corners, woodland and fast open grass sections. I now have the Welsh Cyclo Cross champs this weekend so am looking forward to that and will hopefully have a good ride there with some specific training this week. I hope you are all managing to ride with this cold weather and if you are ride safe…there’s nothing worse than crashing and causing injury when it can be avoided!

Ben