Rider Diary: Tracy Moseley 
Interview with Tracy Moseley - September 2009
Britain's most established female downhiller, Tracy Moseley has been racing at the highest level for 15 years and is one of the only gravity racers to have won a round of both the downhill and fourcross World Cup, alongside multiple national titles and the prestigeous UCI Downhill Mountain Bike World Cup in 2006. With only the rainbow stripes elluding the Malvern-based rider, 2010 and Mont St. Anne would be an apt counterpoint to Steve Peat's astonishing World Championship title in 2009. Read Tracy's feature-length interview here, before catching the latest in her rider diary.
August 12 2010
Wow! The last six weeks has just flown by! I stayed out in Europe between Leogang World Cup and Champery pretty much basing myself at Chatel in France. Chatel is part of the Port Du Soleil, so is linked up to a massive area of chairlifts, all ready for epic days in the mountains.
I spent the first week with my Trek World Racing team in Chatel, doing some fun rides and also an XC riders versus the downhill riders challenge (the riders included Emily Batty, the Fluckigers, Andrew Neething and Justin Leov - Ed). We all had to do a DH course and XC loop against the clock. I challenged Emily and after doing the DH first I had a time percentage that I could afford to be behind after the XC loop, and somehow I managed to get within one second of the time on the most gruelling XC track, to take a win for the DH team!
Sadly the DH boys were both beaten by the XC boys so it was a win for the XC ! think next time we will definitely have to make the courses a bit fairer, a more gnarly DH track and an XC course with less climbing!
The following week I stayed and trained in Chatel. Trek also had their 2011 launch for the Remedy, Scratch and Fuel Ex, so I had chance to see a lot of the new stuff, hang out with loads of Trek guys and media, so it was a fun week, with some great riding.
I also managed to get to see the start of the Tour De France as it left Morzine. That was quite an experience, just to see the size of the Tour and the money involved in it was incredible. All the buses and vehicles with each team was mad. It really did make the MTB scene look like a very poor brother.
I also squeezed in a trip to the Mega Avalanche; I think this is a race everyone who loves DH and racing should do one day. It's quite an incredible experience starting on a glacier with a load of other people around you, helicopter flying overhead just waiting for the start!
It was hard as there was a lot of snow, but the weather had been so warm that the snow had melted, so in the race we had to run all the flat snow sections for about ten minutes, pretty hard going and by the time I got off the snow I had managed to get into second place, but my snow riding skills were not up to those of Anne Caroline Chausson and I was already about two minutes back.
Only a few minutes into the rocks I dropped my chain, it got jammed and twisted and meant that I could not pedal so I had to freewheel and run for the next 15 minutes until I came across a group of spectators and managed to borrow a chain of one of their bikes! So after chain swapping I was probably back in 20th place. I then spent the rest of the race just trying to pass as many people as possible to finally finish fifth. I was really happy to get back up to fifth place and really loved the race. I will definitely do it again, but next time with a chain device...
After the Mega it was back to World Cup racing, first stop in Champery, the steepest track on the circuit. Having had such good weather it was dry and loose for the first day of practice and pretty good fun to ride. Sadly that was the end of the good weather and for the next two days it just rained and rained and rained. The track became really hard and I really felt like I was just getting down the hill and not racing. I ended up fifth after a crash and numerous collisions with the course tape. I was glad that weekend was over.
The following weekend was Val Di Sole World Cup, the same venue as the 2008 World Champs. This weekend we finally had the weather on our side and after just one afternoon of rain it dried up and the racing was very fast, and dusty!
I loved the track and felt great in practice. I just tensed up a bit in the final and rode too safe in a few sections but ended up third, so I was pretty happy to be heading in the right direction with my riding with only four weeks ‘til worlds.
I then had the long drive home after a great six weeks in Europe, straight home, put the washing machine to the test and then straight out to check out the National Series that I have neglected so far this year. I went to Moelfre for round four. It was great to see such a well supported series, great number of spectators and media and a pretty fun weekend all round. I took the win ahead of Katy Curd and Jess Stone.
Now it's two weeks at home before the final trip of the year out to World Cup finals and then the World Champs.
Tracy
