Hello!

It's been a while since my last Race News. Part of it has been that I didn't write race reports for the last races I did, and another reason is that it's been quite a long time since I have done some races.

But now I am back again! I think this time I will have a lot of time to concentrate on what's important. After all I am done with school and things seem to go well for me now.

And so did the first race in 1,5 years go! I was very happy with my performance. The race I am talking about was the opening AMBC and 3rd MBAA race (American Mountain Bike Classic/MountainBiking Association of Arizona). The race was held in Goodyear, AZ at the Estrella Mountain Parks.

I felt a little rusty in the race preparation. It seemed like I couldn't find anything I was looking for. :o( I ended up racing in my non-racing glasses. My warm-up was slim. But luckily the race was held in the warm Phoenix!

I arrived at the start staging last and had a bad start position. But I got an amazing start! In less than 300yards/meters I was in 3rd position. (There were c. 35 semi-pros/pros lined up).

Going into the singletrack in such a good position I decided to just spin and ride my own race. Todd Wells (Moongoose) started pulling away, but I knew he is in great shape at this time of the year, so I decided to let him go. My friend and teammate Jason Tullous passed me and started his chase for Todd Wells. Jason ended up coming as close to 5sec away from Todd but ended up in 2nd place c. 20sec away from the win.

I rode in 4th place for most of the race but then in the last climb I got passed by two riders. Brian Matter and Scott Blanchard. It was a shame that I couldn't keep up with them on the last climb since podium for this race went to the top 5. But I was still extremely happy to have done this well!

My training has just started and I feel confident that I will improve a great deal later in the season.

Thomas

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