The National Trophy was on last weekend, meaning that a trip to Newport could possibly spell a victory. I knew that I had a chance of winning, I had looked at the start list for the National Trophy and only 1 rider who had beaten me so far this season wasn’t on it. The day before had been wet and muddy, which meant that I thought it was going to be a mud fest. I was wrong. There was a couple of slippy sections but it really wasn’t that bad. It was almost a bit basic, the only truly technical section involved riding down a steep muddy bank, but in a straight line.
I warmed up on the course where possible, and went to be gridded. I was gridded front row, but with a tight start I knew it was going to be important. My start was all right but I got squeezed out between a couple of riders and went round the first corner in 5th. I moved up into 3rd on the next couple of straights because I knew positioning was crucial before going down the hill. I accelerated into 2nd before the descent, and the rider in front of me messed up the corner at the bottom and I moved into the lead. I put the pressure on up the climb back up and got a small lead, things were going perfectly.
I decided that I wanted to do a Mathieu Van Der Poel and have a gap at the end of the first lap. That’s what I did, I had a 20 second advantage going onto the second lap. From there it was a time-trial, I slowly extended the gap as much as possible. Whether or not I could have gone faster I’m not sure, while it felt hard at the time you can always find something extra when actually racing somebody. 
By the final lap I knew I was going to win, I had a huge advantage. It’s the first time that I’ve ever won a race that wasn’t close, all the others have come done to the final lap. In the end I won by 1 minute and 20 seconds, a pretty reasonable advantage seeing as the race was only 30 minutes long. Really looking forward to seeing how I can do next weekend when there is no National Trophy!