Having raced twice at crow hill last year I was familiar with the area that the loop would take in, this years lap was effectively last years loop in reverse with a couple of new bits thrown in for good measure.

Crow Hill is well draining and therefore despite a fair bit of rain prior to the event the course as expected held up not too badly, drying out throughout the day. Unfortunately for me these are conditions that I often fair badly in, preferring the course to either be very wet or dry rather than the sticky intermediate that we encountered. To be fair I was also victim of my own riding habits over the winter, I spent more time out on the road prior to this race and although over the past 2-3 weeks I have spent much of my time off-road the conditions have all been dry so I was a little rusty in the mud. On the positive side when the track went uphill or I was able to use some of that road fitness on the smoother parts of the track I was going well. Looks like a bit more work on my technical skills is certainly going to be high on the agenda over the coming weeks.
 
Despite my gripes with my own riding Crow Hill is a great race track and surprisingly challenging despite no big hills, the track is relentless in the effort it demands. Hopefully when the British XC series heads there at the end of June it will be dry and I will be racing in better form.
 
Overall the course was good, the organization of the event was good, the only let down was my own riding, but I will keep plugging away and working hard to rectify that over the coming races.
 

Best Regards

Mark
bucksmtb.co.uk XC Team Rider