It's Been a super busy past 3 weeks. It all started with a bit of a more laid back race at the Toowoomba BMX club Open Day, which is my home club. There was some good racing with 3 full gates of Pro men. Kamakaze, Jamie gray, Steve Janssen, Glen Codega, and my big Bro N-rod Graves all had a race, as well as about 15 other fast rippers. So it was a good race with 3 of the 5 member Olympic squad present.

To cut a long story short I had a comfy win, ‘Kama' only came up for the annual Toowoomba swap meet to try and find new parts for his car, and decided to race on his way home and took 2nd, and Jimbeeee Gray in 3rd. At least ‘Kama' was honest about his priorities for the weekend haha (which was swap meet 1st, racing 2nd)!

There was a fairly beefy winner's cheque up for grabs as always at Toowoomba, so the win was very welcome!

From there it was time to pack things up and head off for the 1st supercross BMX World Cup of 2008 to be held in Madrid Spain. The track was indoors, actually the 1st indoor supercross ever which was cool, but at the same time crap. Cool that there was no way the race could be affected by the weather, and made a great atmosphere, but crap that the track was WAY too tight and short. 6 pedal strokes in the 1st straight is never going to sort anyone out and it showed.

The one thing I love about BMX is that there is the whole training aspect of the sport, to be fast over a 20 pedal stroke sprint to the 1st turn, and the skills aspect, to be fast for the rest of the track but no one is going to get sorted out in 6 pedal strokes - especially at this level.

Anyways, qualifying was first up and I put together a decent lap to put myself in 9th place, there was .25 of a second between last and 9th to show how tight it was.

I was feeling good come racing, had some biff and barge in my 1/8ths rounds, but no worries, the only thing that was concerning me was my inconsistent gates, late one gate, then too early the next, I have no idea why, my gates have always been one of my strong points, but I just couldn't get it together like I had wanted. I was still coming out with my old MTB rival ‘Prokop', so I knew I was still going ok, but I should have been coming out better.

I got to the lead in my 3rd 1/8th heat by the first turn (the 3rd heat is the most critical as your position in your last heat decides your lane choice for the next round) when I was punched from behind by Arno Kanis. About 5 guys came up to me after the race to tell me how out of control he was off the last double going into the turn, but i suppose that is racing. I found myself going from 1st to last, but I was still safely through to the quarters. But I would now have to make do with lane 7.

This ended up being a funny race, I got a decent snap, but instantly balled up with ‘Prokop' next to me from the start, and it was all downhill from there. Coming out of turn one I elbow locked with fastest qualifier Mike Day down the 2nd straight and we both went down, and racing for the day was over. It was pretty disappointing to go all that way for that result, but I know there were better things to come.

Luke Madill rode well all weekend, qualifying in 3rd, and comfortably making the semis. Racing from here though can go anywhere, and unfortunately for Luke, the direction the race went wasn't his way. But he still got some valuable country points for Australia, to make sure we have 3 Olympic positions.

NZ shredder Marc Willers was killing it and made the main, and finished 2nd, I threw him a "yeah Willdog yeah" from the 27th row of the grandstands just as the gate call stated in the main, which he told me he heard, so it was all worth the dirty looks I got from 5,000 Spanish people for making making noise when i should have been quiet. He went on to finish 2nd behind Arturs Matisons from Latvia. Well done to Arturs who deserved the win after leading the last World Cup of last year before being hit in turn 1. Steven Cisar from USA took 3rd with a solid ride. For some reason everyone is talking about 5 other USA guys before him for Olympic selection, but I'd be picking him for sure, he just gets the job done at the supercross races everytime.

From there it was time to head back home for 1 day before having to drive to the airport again for round 7 and 8 of our Oceania UCI series to be held at North Harbour, Auckland, New Zealand.

The track there was built by Tom Ritz, so it was great to finally have a track that was worthy of Olympic points qualifier rounds. The only downside was the gate. Sweet track, crap gate, 4th beep snapper! Yeeeehawwwwww!!!

Luke Madill flipped the gate in practice, I laughed, that stuff is funny, but to no surprise I flipped it too, he laughed back. Funny stuff, then 45 others flipped it hard too, lots of laughs were had, but the gate still sucked. Then ‘Samabee' flipped it, then ‘Willdog', then ‘Hong Kong Wong'. I think you all get my point. If you didn't flip it you weren't trying hard enough.

I felt good on the track but crap on the gate for Saturday. I smacked the slow gate all day long. I was real bad in the second of my 3 heats, then just a bit in the third, and smacked it hard in the semi, but made it through no worries.

I was determined to put together a good gate and lap for once in the final, i hadn't even come close all day so now was the time and I did. I got the gate, and a good 1st straight and took the win. Willers and Madill had a good battle all the way which ended in them both almost crashing down the last straight. Madill held onto 2nd, Willers slipped back to 6th, which was great country points for us to make sure we have 3 spots at the Olympics.

Brian Kirkham was hauling all day and took 3rd, which was well deserved. I was pretty worried about him in the final being inside me, and I knew he was getting out fast and I was getting out a bit slow.

Day 2

I felt heaps better on day 2. The legs were awesome, and I had killer gates going in practice. So confidence was high, especially after my day 1 win.

My heats went very comfortably, and I got through to the semis no worries. I got lane 8 in the semi and another good gate hit on the turtle gate, but still almost got the holes, so this made me even more confident.

I drew lane 1 for the final, which was probably the slowest on the track, due to how it flattened out on the ramp, but whatever, at least I was inside.

I came out late to make sure I didn't hit the gate at all, and it proved to be a decent strategy as I got good drive after that because of it. I had a wheel length in front by halfway down the 1st straight, but I got greedy and tried too hard and flat landed the main double in the 1st straight and gave up a whole lot of speed. Willers just snuck around the outside of turn 1, and ‘IO' slotted in behind him. From there he didn't make a mistake and I had to settle for 2nd. Madill in 3rd so good country points again.
 
I guess it all evens out, Willers was faster on Saturday but I got the win. I felt I should have had the win on Sunday but Willers did and I had to settle for a 2nd.

It's great to be home again, even if I've only been away for a couple weeks. I can chill for a few days, and catch up on all the sleep that I've lost, and there has been plenty of that!

More soon.

Gravey