Sponsorship contracts for 2015

Coming from a purely amateur racing background, to be talking about sponsorship contracts is so exciting. It also gives hope to us mere mortals that if you train consistently, stay loyal to you LBS, race fair and tell a few people about it all, you can count on some really fun opportunities presenting themselves (if you can catch the swinging door before it closes on you).

SenseCore

I am extremely pleased to announce that I have been afforded the role of Product Ambassador for an exciting new company. SenseCore specialise in human performance monitoring technology. While the concept of keeping a close eye on how the body is performing during training, competition and recovery is not a new concept.  SenseCore sets a new benchmark for athletes to assess and monitor human performance that previously has only been accessible in sports science labs, specialist surgeries and hospitals. SenseCore was exclusively available to F1 drivers, however this rad new tech is now available to anyone.

SenseCore have been developing a market in the northern hemisphere however the company need to get their name out at the ground roots here in Australia and I have been chosen as one of the people to help them. I will be discussing my journey with SenseCore here on this blog.

TLC Cycles and Scott

Over the last 10yrs I have relied on the great service and bikes that TLC Cycles offer. The family owned business have formalised our relationship and I am now an official Scott Sponsored rider through TLC Cycles. Brad and Bianca were already looking after me extremely well so nothing really changes apart from having access to cheaper bikes through Sheppard Cycles, Victoria who are head office for Scott Bikes in Australia. May our relationship continue to prosper into the future.

Ride on!

The 2015 season - just stay loose bro!

I was out riding my MTB last year, clipped a rock with my pedal and went straight over the bars. A dude with long hair wearing baggies road past on his 5inch travel fun machine and with a big grin gave me some sound advice “Man, you just gotta stay loose bro”. 

At the time I was tempted to pick up my bike and throw it at him but I thought about what he said and he is on the money. I can’t think of one situation in cycling (or life for that matter) where being tight and constrained will give you an advantage. In fact it is generally quite the opposite. A race can present any number of challenges and if you are tight in either mind or body you are bound to end up making bad tactical decisions or making a bad riding decision resulting in a trip to the first aid tent. If you plan to ride smart during a race, conserve on the flats and nail the hills, then find that you are burning your fuel too fast, you need to change your plan very quickly before it gets away from you. Stick to your original plan and by half way through the race your world of pain will be making the finish line seem a very long way off.

What the banana is all this about… Well I’m going to take the dudes advice and apply to it to my goals. I’m going to look at setting achievable long term goals but allow for enough wriggle room in the short term so I can stay loose and be poised to react to environmental factors that will influence how I can train and which races I can commit to throughout the year.

In 2015 I plan to race the entire CORC XCO 10 round series and my goal is to place in the top 3 of A grade.  This is a huge challenge considering on any given Sunday riders such Daniel McConnell, Dylan Cooper, James Downing, Ed McDonald and Andrew Blair can turn up. All of whom race at National and International level events. I also plan to race at least two National XCO rounds during the year. Ideally I would like to race the Rocky Trail enduro series and a few rounds of the Chocolate Foot solo enduro series. I will race the Rocky Trail series in pairs and will aim to take out the series in 4hr Elite men’s category. However my racing partner and best mate Hamish recently broke his femur so I may need to find someone to replace him for the first couple of rounds. I will also captain the SenseCore team in the upcoming 2015 Mont 24 hour race, in which we aim to place in the top 3.

Subaru National Championship Series
http://mtb.subaru.com.au/national-championships/

Mont 24 hour
https://selfpropelled.com.au/news/?category_name=mont-24-hour

Scott 24 hour
http://corc24hour.com.au/

Rocky Trail Shimano MTB GPseries

http://www.rockytrailentertainment.com/events/MTBGP-overview.html

Chocolate Foot Single Track Mind series
http://www.chocolatefoot.com.au/singletrack-mind-series/latest-news/296-update-2014-singletrack-mind-series-dates

Beyond 2020

Remember that science TV series, Beyond 2000, it ran in the late 80s to late 90s. To a boy in his early to late teens it was an exciting show that illustrated current scientific research projects and took aim at what the future might look like if these research projects were ever to come to effect. I might even look back at some of the old shows to see which of the featured futurists were on the money. I bet there were quite a few. I know this because cycling has taught me that you can directly influence your future based your actions today. I cannot give this sport enough credit for illustrating how a struggle today can lead to exciting levels of personal achievement, tomorrow. 

On a bad day on the bike, you can be in so much pain that breaking a bone would give you some relief. But on a good day, you can be floating above the trail, smashing the pedals with ease and linking corners and jumps together without even thinking about it, all the while your competition disappears in the dust behind you. This is the elusive feeling of being in The Zone, Being on Fire or Feeling Good, there are many names for it. 

To me it is more satisfying feeling then beating a rival, winning an award or stepping up on a podium, because it is actually the ultimate win. This feeling means that you have done everything perfectly, trained hard and smart, recovered sufficiently, eaten correctly, found the right pre-race zen and then executed the performance perfectly. If this eventuates the results should come but even if they don’t, you know you have performed at your peak. The complexities that go into this feeling of euphoria on the race track are so vast it is no wonder it is difficult to find and repeat. But I have faith I will one day find it again, because the elements that feed into a great performance are well known and documented. So in theory, if you control the elements that feed into high performance, and you can control your future, your destiny, your performance and ultimately your happiness and wellbeing. Now to focus on the elements that equate to high performance.

To be continued...

Ride on