First downhill race at Gravity Bike Clubs winter league

This weekend was my first downhill race, it was held in Cloon wood outside Eniskerry.  It was organised by Gravity B.C.  I had no idea what to expect and was not on a full downhill bike but my Genius Enduro bike.  I arrived on Saturday to sign on and practice and after collecting a helmet from Aine McKenna I headed up the hill.  While pushing up I got to see some of the track including some nice berms and big gap jumps and a couple of booters for big air.  I got one full practice run in to see what the track was like and at the bottom met up with Alex Nowotynski and Jonathan Maunsell who were up from Cork, we headed up together and got in some more practice runs and track walks and sessioned some tricky bits to save those few precious points of a second.

I arrived around 11 on Sunday and I headed out to see what the track was like after a night of heavy rain, while there was some big puddles of shlomp to power through, the track was mainly dry and was still as fast and loose as Saturday.  My start time was 12.03 and so had time for one full run and watch some practice runs.  Then back to the top for 12 where one of the marshals checked my body amour and I lined up ready to start.  The clock started counting down from 30... a beep at 10, a couple of deep breaths and another beep at 5... 4 and I went (in downhill you go anytime after 5), I sprinted from the off and launched off a rock into the first berm and up into the wood and so began two minutes of  adrenaline fueled lunacy, two minutes of rocks, roots, berms, gap jumps and booters, the track was brilliant with a great mixture of everything.

My first run went well, I got most of the lines I had been practicing on Saturday and was delighted with a time of 1:46:009 which placed me 16th overall.

 My second run went well it was similar to run one except I took a slightly faster line around the first booter and had a complete clean run top to bottom, I felt happy but was actually 0.2 of a second slower.  I won the U16 class and really enjoyed my first downhill race.  The Scott Genius was a brilliant bike to ride and after racing both XC and DH very well on it I can't wait to race it in the Gravity Enduros.  It really is one bike for all mountains.

   Thanks to Adrian Van der Lee and Bartosz Murzicz for the photos and to Aine McKenna and Silvia Gallagher for lending me gear to race in.

Thanks again to Donnybrook Landscape Co/Scott for their continuing support.