Wednesday 7 April 2010

Now a Qualified Guide!

This weekend was the day of the assessment for my TCL, I was pretty nervous about it before hand and had had a killer week leading up to it (the week before Easter, running an e-commerce company selling camping equipment... we were a bit busy). So I'd barely had any time to actually think about the assessment - I think I was most concerned about the 5-10 minute presentation we were supposed to give on a particular subject. Mine was "Action Centred Leadership", which isn't the most complicated of subjects, but is tricky to talk about in enough detail for 5-10 minutes when you haven't really prepared.

So Thursday lunchtime I had to pull myself away from work, feeling like I was leaving everyone still in the shit a little, and get in the van to drive 2 hours to Devon to pick up Mark followed by another 5.5 hours to Betws-Y-Coed in North Wales. I realised half way there that I'd left all my carefully prepared route guides and log books on my desk at work, way too late to do anything about it! We finally got in about 22.30 with both of us pretty much ready to fall asleep - all plans of last minute reading went out the window and we went straight to sleep. Or at least I did, I went to sleep so quickly I'm can't be sure what Mark did.

Friday Morning started early with a bit of last minute reading and bike tweaking (despite which my bike spent most of the day ghost shifting) before driving 2 minutes down the road to the assessment site. The rest of the day went really rather well, except the pouring rain that is. We had 2 novice riders along for us to lead who were really good, put up with our slightly cack handed leadership at times and thankfully seemed to get something out of the day. My presentation ended up being not too bad at all, and everyone passed without any concern. If it weren't for the massive relief I felt it would almost have been a bit of an anti-climax!

That evening had celebration written all over it, and we headed out to the pubs of Betws full of intentions to drink until we passed out. Which is exactly what we did. Except it turns out that it only took 2 pints for us to pass out... which was a bit of a running theme for the weekend.

Some time soon I'll write a little more info about what I had to do for my course, but briefly now I'll mention who I've done it with as I've been really lucky and ended up doing both my SMBLA and First Aid Courses with some top people who have made the whole process really good fun as well as informative.
So, my SMBLA/TCL was done with Al Seaton of Wheelie Cool Mountain Biking: http://www.wheeliecool.co.uk/
And my first aid course was done with Guy at Adventure First Aid: http://www.adventurefirstaid.co.uk/

I thoroughly recommend both of them.

Wednesday 31 March 2010

Long time between updates

So it's taken me nearly a month to get around to another update, it's not really through lack of news but lack of time. Between tying everything up at work, preparing everything I need for Canada, trying to sell most of my stuff and occasionally getting some riding in I don't seem to find the time to update here at the moment!

Nearly two weeks ago now was my first go at leading a group ride "in the wild". It was only really scheduled as a group of us from Cornwall FreeRiders heading up to Dartmoor for a day of XC, but the ride kind of grew and before I knew it I was leading a group of 23 people! Although my only official position being the person who had done the ride before, with all the SMBLA and First Aid stuff I've been immersing myself in I couldn't help but feel a bit more responsible.
Despite initial nervousness I relaxed into the ride pretty quickly and everything went really well! We had 2 people head back to the car park fairly early as they were really struggling with the climbs, and one more headed back around half way thanks to a migraine. One minor injury happened, which gave me a great chance to use my new first aid kit without anyone being really hurt!
In the end the best part of the ride for me (better even than all the fast and rocky descents) was in the car park at the end when a good portion of the riders came over to thank me for leading the ride. I'm not sure I really did enough to warrant it, but it felt awesome to be in some way responsible for those people having a good day.

I think I'm going to like guiding.

Tuesday 2 March 2010

60 Days to Canada

It feels like a milestone today, just 60 days until I get on that plane! It definitely feels like a good place to start this blog.

Where am I now? I'm still in the middle of selling everything I own, working like mad to tie things up at work and not sleeping enough as I worry about my finances for the summer. There's sod all time in there for riding at the moment. Both my bikes are in a bit of a poor state actually, my Pitch got pulled apart 3 weeks ago for a bit of a service, and has never got back together. My singlespeed has a buggered chain and the singlespeed specific replacement I bought wouldn't stop skipping. So, very little riding for me at the moment.
It's quite hard to focus on everything you do going towards a summer of non-stop riding when that means you don't seem to find the time (or, if I'm honest, the inclination) to ride your bike now.

Fortunately I've got a good kick up the mojo coming this weekend, with the second round of the Cornwall Freeriders cup being held at Rosewall. I was gutted to miss the first round due to a course, so lucky for me the second doesn't clash with anything and the only obstacle to my racing is being able to get my bike in a rideable state on Saturday. Hopefully without taking a box of bits in to the bikeshop at 16.30 begging for help!