The historic Margam Park, in Neath Port Talbot, played host to the first round of the Welsh Mountain Bike Series today. Three weeks ago would have seen the course blanketed in a covering of clean white snow, unlike today, which saw the course swimming in a sea of mud! There's been no hiding the fact it's been wet here, very wet. To get some idea of where to watch the race, I watched the preview video of the route on the events website. Taking into account the weather I headed for the copse of trees - where Go Ape is located. Here the course wound it's way through the trees, so offered some shelter from the rain. The course was tough going, the ground was saturated, in fact it was literally a river of mud in places.
It was a constant battle to keep the camera dry and the lens clear of water, a battle which the rain was winning. I walked along side the track to where it emerged from the trees, here the track ran trough a quagmire which was criss-crossed with roots - a difficult combination. As well as watch the competitors ride, push, crawl, fly (I did say fly) and in one poor child's case, cry; I could see them climb to the lower ridge line at the top of the decent through the rhododendron.
Despite my constant struggle with the rain, the spot I chose turned to be quite a eventful one, the bog was a brutal wheel swallower, with over a dozen riders going over the handlebars, with various degrees of style! I wish I'd brought the strap for attaching my GoPro to a tree to catch some of the spills.
I've uploaded some (more to come) of my photo's from the event to my
Flickr page, if you'd like to purchase a photograph, please drop me an
email, with the photo number or comment below and I'll get back to you. I donate a percentage of any sales to the MND association.
As a side note, they say a bad workman blames his tools, but I'm constantly disappointed with the focusing on the 7D (especially when using the 24-70 lens).
It's not strictly on topic for my blog, I'm not that much of a football fan. But it was an opportunity to see something which hasn't happened for 100 years and to take a few pictures. Swansea City Football Club won the Capital One Cup on the weekend, their first major piece of silverware in the 100 year history of the club. There was an open top bus parade starting from the Dragon Hotel in the centre of Swansea and finishing at the Guild Hall. Considering the time of day (16:30 on a Tuesday) the crowds turned out in force to welcome the team and the trophy back to the city. With the global exposure that top flight football brings, lets hope that the club will do well in Europe in the coming year and also continue to do well in the Premier League, as it can only be good for the region and for Wales as a whole. For some more photographs of the parade, check out my flickr site.
