Well, there went November. Highlights? Mostly 'cross related. Big bunch of friends down for a South/North Downs unsuitable bikes extravaganza (with additional Bonfire night pyrotechnic shenanigans). And my first proper 'cross race - 3Ps doesn't count, somehow - unlikely to be anything Fisher Price will be marketing in the near future, but so gloriously, curse-inducingly painful that I might just have to find the time to do another one before the winter's over. Currently suffering a disturbingly high broken bike tallly - running on one sticky DT Swiss frreehub (Unit), two knackered Mavic XC717s (Unit again) and two nearly knackered, precious, blue-grey Open Pros (Omega); one rattly Octalink bottom bracket (Jake), one actually now rather stupidly worn chainring that keeps dropping its chain (Kogswell), and one slow puncture that holds air for just long enough to not make it worth finding the time to fix (Unit, *again*). Are they possessed? Or just protesting belligerently about the distinct lack of TLC that muddy corner of the house has received over the past few weeks? Who knows. Still, at least the running shoes have yet to join the dirty protest...

Jenn

On Friday as the wind was swirling the leaves around outside on the road and the sky was crisp and blue, I sat and stared at my books and wished and wished I was outside playing in the woods with my bicycle. So when the (fierce and scarey) postlady arrived bearing packages from Minx I jumped around with excitement and immediately changed into my new kit. The lovely, soft, gorgeous and snuggly Pearl Izumi tights and divine pink Pearl Izumi jersey gave me the excuse i needed to slam shut my books and leap onto my bike to tear off around the woods. I blame Minx entirely for leading me astray. Being nearly 30 you would have though that acquiring a few new bits of cycling kit would be met with mature and calculated observance and intelligent comment. No way. They wer SO comfortable and SO pretty, I got back from my ride, immediately washed them, wore them on Saturday to show off to my roadie mates, immediately washed them and wore them again on the wet and muddy Quantocks with 'the lads' on Sunday too. That is where the honeymoon ended. The beautiful Somerset coombs are now covered in a thick, crunchy layer of yellow and orange beech leaves which cover treacherous mud and slippery roots. As I happily trekked up and down after my superfit ‘lads’, I was still thinking 'hmmm I look GOOD' as I caught sight of the lovely pink and sleek black of my new outfit. But as the tears streamed from my eyes on a particularly fast descent I mis-timed a turn, the backwheel slipped and I tumbled off, sliding over the pretty leaves on my left side. I soon discovered that pretty as they may be, autumn leaves don't form a very soft cushion and my lovely, gorgeous, perfect tights had become ripped and bloody. Aghast as I was, I slapped a melonin patch on my rather ugly, ripped knee and shot downwards towards the bottom of the coombe and enjoyed the rest of the morning. (Of course I can't now move my knee and it is oozing disgusting horrible yellow stuff but let's not go there).

Fi

...and that's it, season over! Dusk Til Dawn was the usual customary end-of-year ball - I'm sure something will happen one day to make it less than perfect (raining frogs? plague of locusts?) but it just goes from strength to strength and is probably my favourite event of the year. Over 500 lovely friendly riders, a fantastic course (and I mean *really* fantastic - the Thetford singletrack is just perfect, all polished berms and swooping, sinuous trails through the trees), spangly 'mood lighting', one of the best thought-out solo pits I've seen (no tedious schlepping of kit across a field - just park up and work from the car), gallant work from Timelaps in the face of twelve hours of trying to read number boards behind blinding HIDs, just enough trade support to keep those not riding amused, fed, and spannered throughout, and above all the loveliest small-town atmosphere that no other event seems to manage to replicate. The Thetford MTB Racing crew work so hard and achieve such great things; a huge, huge thank you to them for all their tired, tireless efforts and the plentiful original thinking that makes Dusk Til Dawn so special.

The ladies solo field was the biggest of any ultra-endurance event this year (did you know that any evemt over 4 hours long is classed as ultra-endurance? No, neither did I - I've done commutes that are longer than that!), and it was great to see all 14 grrrls complete at least the required 2 laps to finish. For various reasons I'd really wanted to win this one; I don't usually get all fired up and aggressive about a result, because I'm mostly racing against myself but I decided to change tack from my usual softly-softly approach and ride very hard indeed hard from the off. Suffice to say, it worked - after red-lining for 3 laps, I settled into a slightly more sustainable pace but still found myself attacking all the singletrack sections with gleeful fury and going far, far, far faster than I ever have done in an enduro before. The threatened rain never materialised and we rode the whole night long under starry skies (with the occasional stray one shooting overhead); it got very cold indeed (but then it wouldn't be Thetford if it didn't); first a battery and then a light failed (the latter through numpty user error); the iPod threw a gurgly fit at being asked to cope with twelve hours stuffed down my shorts and the whumps made eating near-impossible but heavens, was it fun. At one point I dropped into a particularly swoopy bit and suddenly lost all sense of direction; like being thrown into a tumbledrier, there was no up, no down, no left or right, just the faith that if I followed the swirling ribbon of dirt it would take me where I wanted to be going. And it did - twelve hours, 138 miles and nowhere-near-enough-food later I spun over the line to a beer, some terribly unflattering photos and a finish as not only first solo woman, but also third in the solo men. That'll keep me quiet for a while, then. Rock on...

Jenn

Out on the road bike this evening for a last prime-the-legs ride before Dusk Til Dawn. Feeling slightly sad now that this is the last chance to go properly fast for a few weeks - recovery from long, hard races takes weeks, rather than days, and I know now that I shouldn't expect to be contesting any roadsign sprints for at least a month. Which is a shame, 'cause I really do love riding the road bike...

Jenn

And so the night-time commutes begin. Lupine, 2 x rear lights (lesson learnt), reflective stuff all over everything, mudguards and twice as much food as I'd usually take (it's dark, therefore it's cold, therefore more cake, right?), and out over the Downs for a long-way-home to remember. Clouds of kamikaze moths, curious bats doing fly-bys, badgers, deer, glorious sunsets, spooky trees and flickering probably-nothing-but-could-be-anything shadows playing mind games.... First of many. Hurry up autumn, you're overdue.

Jenn

Jenn

A salutary lesson in preparation and a slight bite on the arse for being cocky. Went for 'short' night ride on North Downs with a friend last night; and realised that whilst I know my properly local trails well enough to be able to get around them with my eyes mostly shut, the same doesn't work when you try and transpose routes that you only ride on the wheels of locals on sunny Sunday afternoons onto wet, dark, windy Tuesday nights the day after a raging storm's passed through and switched all the trails around (and don't even mention the light failures, lack of food, and hour-long wait for the train). Black dog, anyone...?

Jenn

Three peaks

Isn't it funny how sometimes the things you're most worried about end up being the most fun? 3 Peaks Cyclocross this weekend, and boy had I worked myself up into a complete frenzy of nervous terror beforehand... All went terribly well, though - the climbing wasn't as bad as I'd expected (thanks to pipe lagging and Newtimber steps), the descending rocked, big time (thanks to the wonders of unintentional speed and gyroscopic forces), and the road bits, well, they were tedious, but Yorkshire views and a little bit of eye-bleeding effort more than made up for that. End result: a totally unexpected third place (hence grubby kit in podium pictures - whoops!), a sub 4hr30 time when I'd been hopeful of 5hr, and a great big tired smile all the way home. The only downside? I'll have to wait another whole year before doing it again, because there's nothing quite like it at all. Roll on 2007!

Jenn