Pearce Cycles Midlands Summer Series Round 2 - 19/20 April AND the new YETI!!

Round 2 was at Hopton this time, and once again it had been raining just before the race, but this time it had made a difference. It was a bit gloopy in a lot of places, and very muddy in others, not helped by the rain during the night and on and off throughout Sunday. The track was still fun though, with some tricky rooty sections at the top.


Anyway I also got my new Yeti 303 on the Saturday morning of practice day. I spent some time getting all the controls where I wanted them and then got up the hill to have a go. More or less immediately I was pretty stoked with how it felt, but I really wasn't pushing the limits of the bike - definitely on a proper cruise and just getting a feel for it. After a conversation with Jenny Adams who had been marshalling all day I decided I better get into attack mode ready for the race the next day. The next few runs felt pretty wicked even though the bike had a 450lb spring in it! A 300 would suit me much better. The next day I continued to get on the attack and really felt like I could corner the bike pretty hard. In my second race run I cornered a bit too hard, the front wheel drifted out into some soft slushy mud, and I went down. It cost me valuable time but I finished the race only a second off my first run time despite the crash, and I was only a second off the win which on a bike I'd only got the day before I was pretty happy with - Aimee's turn on the top step of the podium this time!

I was really happy with my bike though, so much so that after my race run I went back up the hill with the Elite men for a sneaky run down one of the other tracks on the hill!