AWABA NSW State Championships

Ian and Thomas travelled to AWABA, about 50Ks from Newcastle on 8th-10th of August for the NSW State Championships. After taking out the series, Thomas was hopeing to carry over his good form.

After arriving Thursday night, Friday saw an early start to practice. After the track walk we hooked up with the old crew from Nowra and dad put in a solid day of shuttles.

We stayed in Toronto about 15mins from the track. After an early night we were back at the track, practice went well till a mate from Del Rio pulled out on one of the elite riders causing him to stack big time (OMG it was Brad Kelly)! Brad was then airlifted by chopper. Game over track closed for the arvo.

Sunday; early practice was going well till some rider got smashed up in the rock garden producing another air lift. It was at this stage that the race marshals decided that the rock garden (best part of the track) be taken out of play. Thomas was disappointed as this was where he had the advantage over his competetors.

Race run went well with Thomas winning on the remaining track by 5 second in a time of 2.18.81

Thomas's Take on Track:

AWABA
This would have to be one of the coolest tracks on the planet it has everything I like, big rock gardens, heaps of jumps, fast downhill fire road, switch backs and drops. Only problem was they closed top of the track for race run due to carnage. I had three awesome days of downhill riding!






Play short Vids.



A 6 hour drive home arriving at 11.30pm and up to School and work on Monday all good!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ANDREW!!!

ANDREW TURNS 11 ON 08/08/08

Dual Slalom & 4X - State Rnd 4

Another weekend of racing for Thomas. He decided that he'd like to give the Dual Slalom and 4X a go at Stromlo on the weekend of 2 & 3 August. Thomas's mate Shane and his Mum Jill picked up Thomas and Kerry on Saturday morning to head to Stromlo for the Dual Slalom. Not knowing quite what to expect, having only ever raced a Dual Slalom at Thredbo for Interschools, we were very suprised to see that the track was straight down a fire road. All Mum could see was gavel rash! Due to the lack of numbers, they decided to race the 13's, 15's and 17's together. Everyone had to do a timed qualifying run to see where they would run in the race. Thomas qualified fastest in his whole group so he got lane choice for all his races. After 4 race runs down the track, Thomas finished first in his group. They were then broken down into their correct age division and he had to race the final against the kid who was coming second in the 15's. Thomas pinned it down the track, cornering extremely well, nearly got taken out by the his competitor who was a bit out of control but luckily managed to avoid a collision and crossed the finish line first. Another Gold medal to add to the collection. YEAH THOMAS.

After an early rise Sunday morning to watch the closing stages of the world Dh series in Canada on the net, Mum, Dad and Andrew headed off to football in QBN, Thomas was picked up by the Cooma crew for a solid morning of 4x practice. Andrew scored a solid win against the Roos bagging a couple of tries and a goal Result 16-12 then we headed to Stromlo. Racing kicked off around 1pm. Thomas's first heat went well with a convincing second place. In the second heat about 10 mins later Thomas got the bad end of the "bear trap", stacked and got tangled up with another rider, still finished a gutsy third. Third heat 10mins later Thomas posted another third place to secure a place in the semi finals. It was at this stage it was noted that he was not looking or feeling too flash. We then noticed that he was absolutely buggered. We worked out that a combination of the flu, way overpracticing in the morning and a big day before all took its toll. It was decided that he should retire to save himself for the State Champs at AWABA next weekend. Put that one down to experience!