Lisa Morgan - Kiwi Mountain Biker

Oh, and I booked my flights last week!!!!!!  It kind of feels like there’s just one more step before I go past the ‘point of no return’.  Not that I would want to turn back, but it’s definitely a pretty freaky feeling!  That last step is to pay for the flights in full, which will be done this week!  My race schedule is also now fully confirmed and I’m entered for the first event which is a 3 day tour with some loooooong stages.  Imagine riding round Taupo and then some with 2 days and 3 stages already in your legs!  That’s what I’ll be doing on day 3 of the Elkhorn Classic Stage Race in just under 2 months time.  There’s kind of a cool story to this one too.  In getting in touch with the organisers I got a reply back just after they’d got some exciting news - local business women had come together and were going to match womens prize money with mens, and they are going to house the women who enter as well!  It’s nice to know that I’ll have somewhere local and comfortable to stay - tours are hard work so anything that benefits recovery is welcomed.

This coming weekend means race 2 of the Wellington Short Track series.  The call has gone out for a kiddies race so if we have the numbers we’ll squeeze in a race for them.  Rego is from 9am at the end of Waiu Road in Wainuiomata.  The course is pretty different for this one - much less technical and a nice stretch of straight where the power-houses will shine, but still plenty of fun too.

Shortly I’m heading out to the Upper Hutt Sports Awards - Gav was nominated for Sportsman of the Year and I’d hate to miss it if he wins!  He’ll be fresh back from 4th place at single speed nats yesterday up in Rotorua.

One thing I’m doing differently this year is getting some of my training in on my sort-of-daily commute.  All that means is that I ride on the days that it makes sense to do so, and drive when it doesn’t.  I’m not your hippy-type commuter.  The main reason I’m doing it is to save money, pure and simple.  I’m getting so good at saving now that I even shopped at a supermarket I avoid whenever I can because they had better savings on petrol (and I suppose it’s handy that I’m now stocked up on toothpast and tooth brushes for a good while to come to get to the $80 for the better petrol deal as I kind of exceeded that just a bit).

Anyway, commuting… on nice days it’s downright cool, spinning away, bopping along to the music (gasp! yes I always ride with my iPod - the one time I didn’t I ended up semi-attached to those 2 taxi’s).  And then there is the virtuous feeling one gets when cruising along past all those cars (which will soon enough come back past but much, much closer).  Hey, I’m not a hippy but that doesn’t mean I don’t get to cash in on the virtue thing.  Well, there may be some bright sides to commuting, but they’re more than evened out by the negatives: leaving in the cold and dark, riding a 100K stretch of road with no street lighting, getting soaked on the way in only to put your wet gear on to ride back out again and struggle to dry out helmets and shoes for the ride in again the next day… but the worst of it is the people who seem to want to kill me.

I’m serious!  There are some really angry people out there.  I’m probably only preaching to the converted here, though I’d quite like the opportunity to preach to these ‘angry’ people.  If someone in a car runs a red I don’t see other drivers suddenly change their course to aim for that driver - but I see it with bikes all the time.  No, we shouldn’t be running red lights but as any one knows who’s spent time on a bike in traffic, sometimes it’s safer to do something that’s technically against the law, so we do it - like getting a start on the big queue of traffic up our bums while there’s nothing coming the other way to give ourselves a better chance of making it to the wider shoulder to move further left.  It’s common sense really.

Then there are the people with trailers wider than their cars.  Ok, if you pass within an inch of me and your trailer sticks out by an inch or more… we’ve got a problem!  And I’ve got an increased heart rate, and huge rush of adrenaline, and go stompy-stompy round the house telling my story when I eventually make it home.  I’ve got a 5 month old kitten to look after and I’d like to be around to watch her grow up thank you (and Tempo is doing very well, crafty little food snatcher that she is).

Then when all that’s been going on I tend to think how inconvenient it would be if I really did get hit.  Last time I was lucky to get away with a concussion, bruising, a massive insurance claim and a story to tell but I’ll never forget that that’s just what I was: lucky.  I’ve got another 6 weeks before I go back to being a full time athlete and train when traffic is much lighter - I’m really looking forward to that.  And something else I’m looking forward to is booking my tickets!  This week!!!  Holy cow man - it’s almost like I’m really going! 

And that’s what keeps getting me out there riding, in the wind, rain, cold, dark, traffic etc - at the end of the day it’s all worth it because it’s what I love and it’s all a part of this incredible experience I’m… experiencing.

The UCI World Cup series started yesterday in Belgium on the popular Houffalize course.  I’ve seen footage, I want to race there too.  Judging by the results things might have been a bit wet and muddy but I haven’t found a report yet… I thought it was summer over there?

We had a pretty good turnout for the event and raised some good funds and I’m just super stoked everyone seemed to have a really good time.  Short track doesn’t have much of a profile but folks are already saying they’d like to see it on the calendar again.  We’ve got 2 more left this series so if you’re wondering what all the fun is about come along to Wainui on the 4th of May or Belmont Regional Park on the 18th.

After the racing it was time for me to get my training in for the day so it was great to be able to head in to Makara for a couple of hours with Ricky, Gav and Rob Kilvington.  We started out riding some tracks in the opposite direction to which they are usually ridden, then hit up a trail I hardly ever ride before doing one I’ve never done and finished off with some old favourites. 

A great day all up and a great way to finish off my first week back in full training.  The trails are running mint as at the moment and it was cool to see lots of people taking advantage of the great conditions.

It’s been pretty crazy to go from a race season without working to working and all this other stuff to do as well.  When you’re racing, particularly when you’re not working through it, you have LOADS of downtime.  You need it all too, because rest and recovery are critical to being able to perform when the gun sounds.  You can spend 30 minutes a day stretching, an hour or more on some mental stuff, read books, watch movies, sit in hot pools (oh yeah!) and just chill - not to mention getting a decent amount of sleep (oh the memories…).  It was a bit ironic to lose my job right when my riding hours were about to drop for an extended period (you don’t ride as much when you’re racing - that recovery thing).  And now, when I’m about to go in to an endurance phase which means some long hours on the bike, I’m working again.  Murphy - boy do you have a lot of explaining to do!

But the job is good.  It has peaks and troughs so during the peaks it’s head down to get the work done, and during the troughs it’s head down to organise 2 and a half months overseas and the short track series I’m running as a fund raiser.  Not surprisingly, there’s a fair amount of work involved in all of that!

The end of my break has come up much sooner than I expected - I start back on a full training schedule on Monday!  Last year my season finished 2 weeks earlier and I didn’t have another season again so soon, so I got a full 10 weeks of just doing whatever.  I did a LOT of running, hit the dirt whenever I felt like it and still got in some good road rides.  This time it’s been 3 weeks and my mind and body seem to know better than I do so there have been lots of ‘rest days’ - I just wish I didn’t get that guilty feeling…  not that I’ll have to worry about that again in a couple of days.

The itinerary for US/Canada is coming together nicely after having to make sudden changes with the new leaving date.  Everything apart from the first 2 weeks is pretty much set in stone, and the hope is that which ever city I land in (will be either San Fran or Vancouver) has some good mid week racing I can get involved in.  After that I’ll get a final endurance hit from a 3 day tour in Oregon, then it’s in to the final 2 Canada Cups in BC and Alberta before a long haul journey across the continent for another roadie in Ontario, then up to Quebec for Canada National Champs and 2 World Cup races.  After that it’s back home for about a week (time to squeeze in an N-Duro - vegas singletrack, yeah baby!) before another World Cup in Canberra. Phew!  Every time I list it out like that I get excited.  I’ll add in more detail as things get closer.  It’s weird but I kind of feel like I’ll jinx it or something stupid if I say ‘this is what’s happening’ too soon - go figure…

So, in my last weekend of ‘freedom’ I’m enjoying just chilling out.  My week days start super early so I’m making the most of the opportunity to sleep in, downloading some new tunes for the iPods, playing with the fur babies and right now I’m watching 24 Solo - an awesome movie about the 24hr solo worlds from 06 (I think).  After that I’ll probably put on Off-road to Athens - an incredible movie about the USA selection process in 2004.  If you get the chance I highly recommend both of these, and MASH - a fixie movie where guys do things on fixies that will make you go ‘huh?’ and ‘but how?’.