Been a long time since i raced an open, and i remember why you need to try and get a good grading from the Handicapper. Well i was put in with many of the A grade riders from Thursday Nights at DISC in the likes of Turbo, Mr Poole, Peter Ganns, and the list goes on. This wqas ment to be a D Grade field!!

So i raced 1 Scratch race and 1 Handicap. There was another Scratch to come at the end of the night but i will get into why i didn't do that later. So from the gun inthe scartch the heat was on and i was out the back pretty quick. I think i hung in there for about 4 of the 8 laps. They were moving and i just couldn't hold the back of the field. The handicap i was given 240 over the 2000 mtr distance and thought that was pretty fair in these kinda fields . I would like to that Jamie Goddard for the great push as i was in the first 4 riders and held that position for my turn on the front. We were hammering along and again the actual pace of the riders was to much for me to bear. I lasted the first 2 laps of 4 and then i was out the back again, trying to hold on and not get lapped.

The reason i didn't stay for more racing, well there were a few really bad crash's in the junior grades and the racing was running really late. My handicap heat was run at 10 ish pm at night!! They had to cancell a whole set of heats and finals for all the riders which was a shame.

So at about 10:30 pm i  went back to the Caravan park to my wife and kids for a good nights sleep.

It was a great experiance and next year i think i might try and do the full week of them.

Racing Thursday nights at DISC has been great for me as of late. I have been slowly creeping to the fronts of the field most weeks, and keeping up with a few of the faster legs in D grade. Over the last few weeks it has been getting faster and faster with the "Ring In's" down for Revolution or the Christmas Carnivals that are happening very soon.

I managed to enter myself into Bendigo on the 30th and have been focusing solely on getting my legs ready for the Handicaps. I have been doing LOTS AND LAOTS of 60 and 90sec MAX Efforts to get the power more linear and hopefully increasing my sprint length.

With my first ever place (3rd in the Motor Pace) at a Thursday Night race at DISC, I think i might be just about to peak at the right time. I feel really good and have kept up the training pressure, as for some reason I respond better training hard and raceing than raceing at the end of a recovery.

So i now look forward to racing Bendigo with the knowledge i might be a chance to make my final!!!!!!!

PS: I now to have a secret weapon!!!