Lachlan Norris

Another World Champs under the belt.

// September 6th, 2010 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

2010 World MTB Championships, Mont-Sainte-Anne, Canada

Dust to mud! All in the space of a morning! It had been good to watch the Juniors and U23 Women to get some nerves going and once again, for the 7th time in as many years I enjoyed what can only be described as a memorable day.

Donning the green and gold, the crowd lining the tape on every inch of the 5km course (I have to admit, I did noticed markedly more ‘buzz’ racing with the big boys this year!), the nerves, the chaos as the gun goes off, the pain, exilleration and satisfaction when it all winds up is why I love this sport so much. This year’s World Championships race for me was always going to be a day to enjoy. As my first year in the senior ranks it was good to take the pressure off, enjoy the race and look for a result to build on in years to come. I aproached the race with a similar mentality and remained focused on being smooth and consistent throughout the race. After a horrible start getting caught in the mess that saw 90 blokes in a frenzied tangle I made it my mission to get stronger as the race went on.

I managed to move through the feild and come back into the 50’s with the hope of climbing higher before I was shot down in a burning heap at the 80 per cent line with only 1 lap to go (in 50th). It wasn’t without incident though and there were definately a few ‘moments’ on the greasy, rooty and rocky course. Anthem and pilot nearly forming magical alchemy, but not quite as I had things out of shape from time to time.

To highlight a few of the more ‘out of shape’ moments; going over the bars and Belgian cyclocross legend Sven Nice in one foul and awkward swoop, when he stalled on a particular rocky chute. But, who could forget the old chestnut of passing German Wolfram Kurschat down the chicken line at ‘the Squirrell’, which is definately not made for two…

All in all a good day out on the track.

Thanks:
Firstly Marty and Linc for telling me to ‘drop it back’ which I did, using the granny to her full potential and helping my legs get through! Of course to the Aussie Team and all the staff in particular Christine O’Connor and Ronald Van Hecke who looked after us ‘oldies’ particularly well. A big thanks to the Giant Faqctory Team for their support over the whole 2 weeks and of course Giant and Drapac-Cycling for the support all year.
Thanks to Castlemaine Cycles, Oakley, The University of Melbourne Sport and The Victorian Institute of Sport.
A massif thanks to the crew from M&D racing (including Mum, and Dad) for making the trek over along with the Thompson Family and cheering us on all day! And to all of my friends and family for their well wishing and support.

Lachlan Norris

Yet again World Champs kicks off with a deep burn!

// September 1st, 2010 // 2 Comments » // Uncategorized

Team Relay, 2010 World MTB Championships, Mont Saint-Anne, Canada

The team; Yours truly to kick out with a start loop and 1 lap against most of the other elite fellas, tap in Trenton Day to rip it up as our stand-in very under 23 male, then off to Ro Fry and Cam Ivory to cannonball in as Anchor man!

The Start; very fast. Ouch… Well warmed I was perhaps a little far back into the first singletrack but otherwise had a decent lap, coming home in 11th and bit over a minute down.

The race; good change overs and a pretty strong effort by a young team, I think we can walk away with our held high!

The bike of choice; Giant Anthem of course, equipped with AC’s tubular wheels (thanks mate) it was eating up the chopped and dusty course!

The staff; Ronald ‘Ronaldo’ van Hecke, Christine O’Connor, Tim Ellison and Ian Potter did a great job as usual.

The immediate future; Junior and U23 lads on Friday along with 4x, elite chicks and blokes on Saturday and Dher Finals on Sunday. Plane time on Monday!

Results; 1 Switzerland 1:06:00  
  Thomas Litscher (MU) 0:15:37  
  Roger Walder (MJ) 0:16:19  
  Katrin Leumann (WE) 0:18:33  
  Ralph Naef (ME) 0:15:31  
2 Germany 1:06:18  
  Manuel Fumic (ME) 0:15:29  
  Julian Schelb (MJ) 0:16:27  
  Sabine Spitz (WE) 0:17:58  
  Marcel Fleschhut (MU) 0:16:24  
3 Czech Republic 1:06:41  
  Jaroslav Kulhavy (ME) 0:15:34  
  Ondrej Cink (MU) 0:15:57  
  Katerina Nash (WE) 0:18:34  
  Tomas Paprstka (MJ) 0:16:36  
4 France 1:07:02  
  Fabien Canal (MU) 0:15:57  
  Julien Trarieux (MJ) 0:17:08  
  Cédric Ravanel (ME) 0:15:34  
  Cécile Ravanel (WE) 0:18:23  
5 Italy 1:07:55  
  Marco Aurelio Fontana (ME) 0:15:28  
  Maximilian Vieider (MJ) 0:17:28  
  Eva Lechner (WE) 0:18:37  
  Gerhard Kerschbaumer (MU) 0:16:22  
6 Russian Federation 1:08:16  
  Irina Kalentieva (WE) 0:18:49  
  Sergey Nikolaev (MU) 0:16:36  
  Anton Stepanov (MJ) 0:17:08  
  Evgeniy Pechenin (ME) 0:15:43  
7 Netherlands 1:08:43  
  Marco Minnaard (MU) 0:16:53  
  Rudi Van Houts (ME) 0:16:12  
  Laura Turpijn (WE) 0:19:28  
  Michiel Van Der Heijden (MJ) 0:16:10  
8 Canada 1:09:53  
  Max Plaxton (ME) 0:16:05  
  Francis Morin (MU) 0:17:25  
  Antoine Caron (MJ) 0:16:59  
  Mical Dyck (WE) 0:19:24  
9 United States Of America 1:10:42  
  Todd Wells (ME) 0:16:04  
  Robbie Squire (MU) 0:16:58  
  Seth Kemp (MJ) 0:17:57  
  Katherine Compton (WE) 0:19:43  
10 Spain 1:10:58  
  Jose Maria Sanchez Ruiz (MU) 0:17:57  
  Antonio Santos Ridao (MJ) 0:18:16  
  Anna Villar Argente (WE) 0:19:49  
  José Antonio Hermida Ramos (ME) 0:14:56  
11 South Africa 1:12:09  
  Burry Stander (ME) 0:15:41  
  Yolande Speedy (WE) 0:22:14  
  Philip Buys (MU) 0:16:57  
  James Reid (MJ) 0:17:17  
12 Australia 1:13:22  
  Lachlan Norris (ME) 0:16:50  
  Trenton Day (MJ) 0:17:56  
  Rowena Fry (WE) 0:20:52  
  Cameron Ivory (MJ) 0:17:44  
13 Austria 1:13:48  
  Christoph Soukup (ME) 0:19:30  
  Gregor Raggl (MJ) 0:18:02  
  Maria Osl (WE) 0:20:08  
  Alexander Gehbauer (MU)

Conclusions; good start to hopefully a great week!

Castlemaine to New York

// August 30th, 2010 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

World Cup Finals, Wyndam, New York, 27-29th August

The twinge of a muscle somewhere deep in your leg that you forgot even existed as you punch over a crest. The sick feeling in your stomach as you gasp for more air holding onto a wheel up the start climb. The feeling as your front wheel drifts away from you on a root while you work to regain focus on the descent. Many of these experiences and more packed in to two hours and packaged as a world cup.

Having not raced a world cup since June I was actually keen to get out a race. With the weather turned up to stellar on the dial and a sweet, short, technical track in tacky condition I was happy to be here and happy to be racing.

Given it had been a very tough week I was pleased to get of to a great start, nailing the first couple of laps in the high thirties. I was throwing the Anthem down the descents with a relaxed and carefree attitude, gaining places on other hardtail sentenced riders. On the third lap as I was midway through bombing a sort of slippery rooty section I copped a spray of sealant to the Oakley lenses and quickly concluded my front wheel had a hole. I proceeded with caution and as the tyre seemed to be holding and rode another lap until changing it up, not super keen too get on my mud rubbered spare.

By this stage I was starting to cramp up in the quads, hamstrings and calves and was working against it to finish off the race, drifting back through the field as I did so. Coming home with some line scabbing left me just out of the top 50. A decent days ride and I really enjoyed the race.

A massif thanks must go to Felice, Joe and the whole the Giant Factory team for taking me under their blue and white wing. Thanks also to Drapac-Porsche, Giant, Oakley, the VIS, Melbourne Uni Sport and a massif shout out to Jono Breekveldt along with Jake and Bruce at Castlemaine cycles for getting my sweet new Anthem up and going with a wicked pair of Fox forks, kashima coating and all.

But the biggest thanks must go out to my fiends and family. With the passing of a very special person this week it has been tough not being around for the people that need me. Jeanne Norris was close to the hearts of many people and I’m proud to call her my Aunty. If she was here today I am sure she would be boasting about the latest achievements of her niece and nephew to her friends! As a very loyal fan and an truly inspirational person I will miss Aunt Jean a lot.

Two from Two in Langkawi!

// August 12th, 2010 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

Langkawi International MTB Challenge

Jumping in our all-conquering, go anywhere, ‘official’ Proton (minus the driver windscreen wiper after an amusing start to our relationship with the beast) we embraced the Malaysian road style to make the pilgramige across to the start of day two. The 6 hour enduro.

Never one to jump at a 6hr MTB race without some hefty prompting, I was surprisingly eager to get amongst it and despite a tough day in the mud the day before, the legs actually seemed ok. Unlike the day before there was a ten fold increase in the amount of people requiring photographs with me (I know, I couldn’t figure it out either) and press wanting some words of (little) wisdom. But, one thing was definately the same as the day before, and that was the sticky heat. It was going to be a long day and after a quick chat to the ex-prime minister we were off and into it.

Lap one gave me a look at the rather technical, generally flowy mixture of forrest trails, beach sections with a bit of road thrown in. There were a few sections that were unrideable from the beginning meaning a bit of off-and-on, I quickly noticed a problem with my left pedal. It had broken on one side which made it very tricky to get back into after running. After a few laps I had come clear of the feild and was getting used to it so declined Jake’s offer of a replacement in the feed zone.

After 3 laps it was quite dissapionting to see the lap board with a big fat number 15 on it. Ouch. It sure was going to be a long day! I had some issues with deciding how hard to pace myself and settling for a solid but not too hard pace gave me the confidence that if I was caught I would have a little in reserve.

The laps wore on. The bidons went down, Jake battling his own stomach turbidity to endure the heat of the feed zone. There were ups and downs and at one point I even came to the period in your life when you start talking to yourself, “c’mon mate, you can do it, 2hrs to go”. That was a mild mental concern.

But as the endless precession of passing riders to the left and right drew to a close I was quite proud of my achievements. Not only to win the race, but also to finish the race! It was motivating to see riders of all shapes and sizes, bikes and kit configurations including some very alarming full length tights and long sleeve jerseys. Wow I certainly wasn’t the only one out there having a hard day!

Crossing the line a little short of six hours it was into the media frenzy that looses it shine after 6hrs on the bike and the next couple hours really drained my malnutritioned and generally fatiqued self. By the last interview my patience was running quite thin, but I still found it amusing that the presenter struggled so much with my name. “Ahh Mr Morgen”, “actually it’s Lachlan”, “Mr Lachlan how was your race..” and “Mr Lance, how did you find the course….” and finally closing with “thankyou and see you later Mr errr…hmmm bye!” I rewarded myself with a little chuckle. The Malaysian hospitality over the weekend sure had been nice and even the most tired or stressed organiser still managed a friendly smile and chat all weeekend.

A great event and one I will have on the calendar for next year. Especially if we have the same, some what deviant, check in fella at Malaysian airlines dishing us up seat A1 for the return journey!

Thanks to the organisers from Langkawi International MTB Challenge, event staff and participants. Thanks to my chief manager, mechanic, soigner and general rouse-a-bout Jason Tolland from Castlemaine Cycles and Bruce and Steph back home for picking up the slack while we were gone. Thanks to Giant, Drapac-Porsche Cycling, Oakley, The VIS and Melbourne Uni along with my friends and Fam for their support.

Course recon earlier in the trip.

In the thickett of it

Rumbling in the Jungle (Rambo style..)

// August 7th, 2010 // 1 Comment » // Uncategorized

As the sweat poured of my everything I was getting a little nervous about not only the harsh heavy air but also the eight laps of what turned out to be a clay-rooty-mudfiesta.

I did get off to a good start amongst the general malysian style chaos with cars, people, bikes, animals and a huge feild of mostly quite inexperienced mtbers. It was pretty good to see such a turn out in one of the more isolated destinations in the country.

Lap one saw me launch of the front on the super slick and steep climb, paying the price a bit for my efforts physically. I opted for a more mud-friendly tire on the rear which despite Jake’s speedy change gave a small group of 4 Indonesian riders the chance to catch up.

I made a point of sucking down as much Shotz electroloyte as is humanly possible. That, coupled with a very controlled effort to keep the needle out of the red as much as possible meant that by the remaining two laps of the race my dual with the last Indonesian rider swung my way and I put in a hard last lap to take the win.

As always my Giant, tweaked relentlessly by Jake Tolland performed without a glitch.

I am sitting here in the open air lobby surrounded by jungle and even the mere act of tapping the iPhone is causing a constant stream of sweat to cascade from my forehead!

Hopefully I’ll get some qaulity zzz in tonight for tomorrow’s 6 hours of joy.

Humidity…

// August 7th, 2010 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

Blasting out of the 10degree rain in Melbourne it was a rude awakening as we hit the 27 degree, 80% humidity Tarmac at Langkawi International Airport!
The short time we have had here we have spent doing track recon, priming the engine with steamed, fried or boiled rice, avoiding middle aged, leathery Australian tourists and of course putting in our share of pool duty.
This morning the track proved to be a greasy clay combination of roots, hard climbing and tight singletrack but with this afternoons roasting sun we may see a drier course by kick off tomorrow. Then again, those bulging cumulous clouds may have different ideas.

IMG_0658.JPG
course recon..

Tour of Gippsland

// August 7th, 2010 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

As we huddled in the van, dripping wet, small icicles forming off the bottom of our ear lobes, waiting for the postponed start of the final stage the mood was a little low. The treacherous course was an issue, but the bigger issue was that the commissaires had decided to cancel the 16 sprint primes, worth up to 3 seconds each. So it was now impossible for us to make up the 14 second deficet for Joe to move into the yellow jersey.
A slight hint of Deja vu as we entered the final criterium of the tour with only a few seconds to gain after 5 days of hard work. The storming conditions rendering the organizer to deem it to dangerous to race for gc but not dangerous enough to cancel all together… Hmmm.
Not to be negated by the conditions we all started and finished off the tour. It had been a good effort by everyone all week and it was especially nice to see Joey bring home the sprint jersey and second overall. 
I felt my ride was good, getting back into racing the legs came around and I was going resonably well on the climbs.
Thanks as always to the dedicated efforts of Sarah, Jono and Agostino and of course Joe, Stu, Adiq, Gus and Michael.

Langkawi International MTB Challenge

// July 21st, 2010 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

Well, after a few weeks of rebuilding after a long early season block of racing I am beginning to look forward to some great upcoming events!

The first of which will be the Midlands Tour road race as a opener for the Gippsland tour next weekend. Following that It will be over to Malaysia for the 2010 Langkawi International MTB Challenge. It’s the first time they have run the event and I will be enjoying the heat in both the 2hr XC on Saturday the 7th of August and the 6hr enduro on the 8th. This should work as a great lead-up preparation for the 2010 UCI MTB Champs to be held in Canada at the beginning of September.

For now it’s back on with the leg-warmers and out on the road for some k’s…

More time on the floor in Belgium

// June 7th, 2010 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

Memorial Van Cooningsloo

1.2 Belgium, 6/6/2010

Sliding along the cobbles in the pouring rain I actually had time to think, “ohh not again”, as I slid for around 20metres before coming to a halt on the side of the road amidst broken bikes, bodies and bidons.

We had ridden only 9.3km into the race, the heavens opening during the neutral zone. After a small climb, I had drifted back through the bunch, trying to conserve some energy. The road turned right and suddenly we were on cobbles as slippery as ice, interspersed with chunks of asphelt. I was super lucky to avoid a nasty crash. I thanked my lucky stars and kept rolling, the road gradually becoming a descent and totally greasy cobbles. As I saw another stack of bodies and bikes developing ahead I quickly tried to avoid being part of the collision and found myself sliding along the road. My bell helmet had clearly done it’s job and thankfully my TCR was in one piece.

I hobbled into the car with a badly corked bum and blood pouring from my arm and hip where I had removed the scabs from last weeks tumble. Within 150 metres we came to a stop to pick up Pat and Tom. They were battered but not broken, unlike Pats TCR which was broken though the top tube.

Gus and Joey finished off the day well, both making the split and riding strongly, Gus claiming a hard fought 5th place.

For now we will be recovering and getting ready for Ronde de L’oise beginning on Thursday in France.

Tough Times in Bordeaux

// June 2nd, 2010 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

Tour of Gironde 2.2

France 3-5/5/2010

After being told by the team that went to Ireland, “last year the weather was awesome, no wind, in-fact tail winds, everywhere” we had high hopes for the tour.

After an epic trip and a leg tearing start the 185km stage one did not really give us what we had hoped. We tried all day to get in the decisive move, which went at around 80km and failed. By the finish we were only four and there were no reports of good legs in the car on the way home.

Things looked brighter in stage 2, although the French style of racing, which mostly consisted of going flat out, attacking until you are so spent you get dropped, only for someone else to start the same proceedure, did take some getting used to. Everyone was feeling a bit better although the stage was brutally hard, leaving only Adiq in the final split of 20 or so at the finish. Pat got unlucky behind a crash and was forced to call it a weekend. I was still feeling very flat and beginning to think maybe I had tipped over the edge into the cooking pot, metaphorically speaking.

Day three and a shorter 170km and rain. I was having concerns about a sore throat and extreme tiredness. The boys rode well, all finishing the tough day in the fragment of what was left of the race, maybe 50 guys. My race took a turn for the worst when, after hitting a nasty pothole I had to call on Jono for a rear wheel. Riding back through the convoy I felt strong and took as many cars as I could when the pace slowed. The road descended, winding and narrow and things were getting sketchy. I was at about car 5 when the road hit an intersection. Perfect I thought and I zipped past the final few cars on the outside, heading for the back of the pelo. Unfortunately I ended up heading straight and along the surface of the road after a greasy section of tar was kind enough to drop me like a sack of wine grapes.

Thanks to Dirk Van Hove, Jono Breekveldt and also Garry Beckett and Drapac-Porsche Cycling.

Thanks to Gus, Pat, Michael, Tom and Adiq.