Cheers Then!

... or, Thanksgiving, as it's called over here. Four whole days with nothing planned beyond some awesome riding and pumpkin pie refueling. Sorted. As is now tradition, the long weekend was kicked off by getting up before sunrise on Thursday and meeting a few hundred other MTB enthusiasts at the Fairfax Java Hut for the annual Appetite Seminar ride. This year I feared I'd be on me tod as Chris couldn't make it and neither could Aaron (recently back after a lengthy summer's abstinence from the dirt.) However, Rosson was riding with his Zeitgeist crew so me and Sam tagged along. I was hoping for a mellow ride, but was actually quite thankful for the spirited pace set by the Zeit' boys. Note - by their standards, it was a mellow ride.... but their mellow is not far off my race pace so I had to push hard. I needed it though. As winter has crept in, my natural winter insulation has grown and made some of our usual rides tougher than they should be. A hard ride of 25 miles with 3500ft of climbing was just what I needed to keep the ever growing fatty sludge at bay.

The Turkey ride was a great start to the weekend. Muddy as hell, rocky and loose and loads of fun. On Friday me and Chris hit China for a quick loop. My legs were slightly cooked from the previous day and Chris was coming down with the lurg, but we layed down some decent shredding all the same. Conditions right now are epic. A steady mixture of alternating rain and sunshine has turned the local trail's dirt into beautiful loamey goodness.

The weekend was rounded off with a quick hangover clearing bez around the city on the Jackal and then a trip to Annadel to ride with Jaime. This weekend is the penultimate one before I go back to blighty for 3 weeks. I felt I made the most of it. The Annadel ride was quite outstanding. We sampled the new South Burma descent (flowey and groomed but not as much fun as the mental rocky goodness of the old Burma.) And I think I only hit my brakes 3 or 4 times on North Burma (highly unlikely but it felt that way...) What a great (almost) end to the year's riding!