Red Bull

Whilst its the middle of summer and most of New Zealand is getting dry and dusty, one place always has mud to be found. Unfortunatly my gopro died before we got to the really sloppy stuff. Merry Christmas to everyone, hope you have a good one!

Went well in time trial today, think 4th (provisional) about 3 minutes behind first, top 10 or so all pretty close, will be interesting to see what the next two days of 432kms of riding the Lesotho mountains will bring!

Pretty hot here in Lesotho, but am coping, bike is handling well, have a great pit crew (Uncle Rod, Wacker, Mon plus everyone else!) so am feeling good.

Traditional early start tomorrow - 5:30am bikes on the line for 6am kick off...

Red Bull Stratos is ready to go, they had a false start today but hopefully tomorrow will be a go. Its an incredible mission and really worth checking out. The website is excellent and I am totally hooked on it.

http://www.redbullstratos.com

Another thing to do when it snows ...

Definitely keen to see this when it comes out!

Red Bull Romaniacs this year was, as always, a great race. Sure I didn't get the result I was afrer, but I still really enjoyed it.

On the second day I actually had broken my foot when I hit a tree branch that whacked my left foot pretty good. I kept riding but only could manage 7th place that day and lost a lot of time.

The Doc said it is probably broken, gave me some really good painkillers, and the next day I was feeling much better. I managed 2nd on day 3 which was good and moved me up to 4th overall.

So it has been an interesting race so far! The first off road day I started 8th, giving me the advantage of being able to follow a bit. I didn't do too badly, ended the day in 3rd, even though I whacked my left foot (not the Dakar foot, for those who are asking!) pretty hard. 

For day 2 of the offroad, I struggled with the sore foot. If you have ever ridden with a suspect broken foot, you will understand it adds an extra dimension to the 'extreme' nature! I didn't do as well, I came 7th I think and was sitting in 4th overall.

Just finished Romaniacs prologue final, came 8th, means I start 5mins30sec after the prolog winner, Jonny Walker, tomorrow for the first offroad day.

Got a bit held up in the prolog but there is 4 days of racing to catch up to the guys, advantage of this is that I will have the guys to follow for a bit which is always good!

Looking forward to the next 4 days of offroad racing, my favourite 4 days of racing all year...

Been quiet here lately I know! Have spent a few days in Austria doing commentating for Erzberg as well as getting my bike ready for Romaniacs.

Now I'm in Romania, we've had the press conference, my bike is all sorted, and I am looking forward to the prologue tomorrow!

To check out coverage of the prologue you can go to Red Bull Live TV:

http://live.redbull.tv/events/78/red-bull-romaniacs/

Here's hoping to a successful 6th in a row Red Bull Romaniacs!

http://live.redbull.tv/events/69/red-bull-hare-scramble-2012-erzberg-rodeo-live/

I'm heading to Erzberg today to do some commentating for the event - it will be streaming live throughout the event so make sure you check it out!