Gabby Day © Dan Seaton
by Gabby Day
This weekend was the first round of the World Cup in Aigle, Switzerland, and it was to be what I would consider my first race, as I crashed out badly at the GVA round in Namen.
I traveled down on Friday with Gregg my sponsor/mechanic/assistant, and it took us over eight hours to arrive at our destination, which was in Thonon Les Bains, France – just short of the Swiss border. It was rather a nice town situated by Lake Geneve, which is the biggest lake I have ever seen – I had to check with Gregg that it wasn’t the sea!
After a good nights sleep we headed to the Aigle to check the circuit out for race day. It was raining pretty heavy and it continued to rain on and off for the rest of the day. The course was pretty flat with some slight off-camber short uphills, a flight of stairs that once you were at the top you had to get on the bike straight away to descend the other side, and part of the BMX track was used too. It was fast and there were some good sections to get good speed and power out, so I was happy with the circuit.
Race day: I was feeling good and confident going into the race, I strapped my broken finger up and knew that I could handle any pain for 40 minutes. I was gridded on the second row. The start was done on a traffic light style, so when it goes green, you go…. That didn’t quite go to plan. On my side of the grid the riders ahead of me were too slow getting away, so I got a terrible start. I missed getting on the group that formed ahead of me and never quite managed to get in contact. I crossed the line 21st.
I was reasonably happy with how I rode considering how the previous race had gone and that I had to take some time out from training and just do some easy days. It was good to get a ’cross race in my legs, and things can only improve from here as I build on today’s result. I hope to get some good training in this week and look forward to next weekend, which is the second round of the World Cup in Plzen, Czech.
See also a press release about Gabby’s newest team.
