It has been a busy few weeks after getting back to work in September. The broken leg still hasn't healed properly but it isn't slowing me down. Since the start of last month I have covered WSBK races in Germany, Italy and France; the Tour of Britain cycle race and have done a couple of magazine features.
It has been interesting to do a couple of new things. I had never been to Nurburgring and it is always interesting to visit a new track. The weather wasn't great and the crowd wasn't so big but there are some nice places to shoot, all spoiled a bit by some 'F1' fencing and over zealous marshalls. I went on track without my photographers vest and wasn't allowed to return to the press office to get it until I was reprimanded by the race director. Only in Germany!
The Tour of Britain was good. It was the first time I had followed a cycle race properly for work and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I was happy with what I shot over the four days I was on the road and have had images published in Cycling Weekly and Cycle Sport magazine. I think in the winter I will do a bit more cycling with the Track Championships at Manchester and some team get togethers at the start of the year.
The last couple of WSBK races at Imola and Magny Cours were good as well. There was a problem with the track on Friday at Imola where the riders felt the track was too slippy and unsafe. After a few hours of hanging around whilst the track was washed and then dried the bikes went out at about 5pm. It meant that they were still on track at 6:30pm when the sun was setting behind the trees and there was a unique opportunity to capture race action in the 'golden hour'. The rest of this month will be taken up with the last race of the WSBK season. Haga and Spies go into the race in a winner takes all position so it should be an eventful race in some way. The week after will see first of all a bunch a journos testing the race bikes followed by the teams trying out their new riders for the first time. All told it is going to be busy. Like always I hope the weather will stay fair.
Once that is done it will be back home to finish off my new website and start on some new projects for the winter and next year. Watch this space for a couple of interesting things coming out. That will be the season over again. Where did it go? It will be February before we know it and the WSBK entourage will be heading down to Australia for the first race. I must be getting old!
