After a rainy drive and a foggy Skövde, the weather got better as I pulled into Tidan. Better means grey but not raining. I rushed out to take a test lap before Sportklass and thought the track was quick fun. But when I took another lap just before the start, the first thing I did was slide massively in the first corner. Hmm.

The start went well and I was keeping up for quite awhile. Everyone in front of me slowed down at the little MTB section through the forest which was fun. The guy directly in front of me got stuck in the little ditch and took a rather spectacular vurpa into the bushes so I passed him. Then it came to the little grass valley/hill thing which I decided to try and ride. It started well and I was almost up the hill but I slipped and fell over landing in some plant that burns like hell. By the time I had come back around to that section, my leg was on fire. And it still is now. Only I could manage this. Just like in Farrisrundan when I fell into an electric cow fence.

After that it was going well and I was trying to catch the next guy up. On Lap 2 I slid pretty bad in both of the grusväg corners and at the forest part I took the root section on a bad angle and almost hit the tree. But it was still going fast. Coming up to the jump section I caught up to Mattias and I could hear the punka on his back wheel. He said 'I'll catch up to you later.' and I took off. Of course at this moment I was passed by the guy who fell in the first lap. So now it was chase time.

In Lap 3 the prestige guys started lapping me and I was starting to slide everywhere. I was losing pace compared to the guy in front so I just started getting cautious hoping they would get tired. I took the löphinder with quite the jump but my stupid pedals were full of mud so I could not get clipped in. That happened for each of the remaining laps. The section with the rock band at the finish line also had a nice little jump and mud hill so when I get pictures I will post them.

Right, so then what about Mattias. Apparently while I was cautious he was slowly gaining on me. He passed me at the finish line and suddenly I was awake again. I was on his tail through the nasty grus corners and up until the MTB section but he was superior in the grass section and I was done again.

By this point there were 2 laps left but by pure luck the prestige group lapped me again at the grass section. I need to work on riding in muddy grass. So I sped up and did my best since, as expected, I didn't have to do the last lap.

And this was good enough for 9th place of 12 in veteranklass! Even if the others were DNF, it still felt good. But what have I learned today? Do NOT fall in bushes. Do NOT relax in the middle of the race. And, most importantly, Tufo Prestige 30 tires are absolutely useless in wet conditions.

After, they opened up the Cykeldistribution warehouse which was full of many fine bikes from Focus. Finally they have started following colour trends because they had some very cool designs. I had to leave before the urges of 'Oooh...me want buy NOW!' took over.

So, CX season is officially started and Chris Cross wants more!