2025 Season Recap: Paid in Lessons, Not Results

Lately I've had a lot of time to reflect on my 2025 competition season, how I performed, how I went about preparing for the comps and the lessons I learned from each one. In this blog I'll go through each competition and dissect what made each one important to my progress as a rider.

First up was a big one. Christchurch, New Zealand. A Crankworx Summer Series Gold event. This is still the biggest competition I have ever competed in and there were a few extra details about this one that made it more special. It was my first competition since I broke my foot the year before and was forced off the bike for three months. It was very close to home and my parents came out to watch me compete for the first time in over two years. 

Despite all this, I had nothing short of a disaster of an event.

Broke $3000 worth of parts, had a heavy crash the day before finals and crashed both of my competition runs. The reality of this sport hit hard. This event taught me that no one is owed a comeback, no matter what has happened in the past. It also gave me a good idea of where the level of riding was at and what I needed to improve on. My motivation was higher than ever to land a run. I finished up in 18th place.

Fast forward about two months and I had arrived in Bergamo, Italy for the second event of the season. This was a Silver event and I was going into this one fresh off a broken hand injury with only six weeks of recovery behind me. I was tentative throughout practice and was forced to keep my practice time to a minimum to keep my hand in one piece. The event was ok, but nothing special. I crashed my first run and had a little slip up in the second run that meant the run was not very competitive. I was happy that I was able to ride with my hand but only managed to scrape together a 16th place.

I had now only two events left to try and gather some significant points to try and get an invitation to the Canadian events. These two events were in Switzerland and Slovakia and were on back to back weekends. 

Switzerland was first. The crime scene of the foot explosion, one year later. While the deja vu was trying to creep in, I managed to get through more than two hours of practice this time and had a plan for a run I was happy with. Qualification day comes around and I line up and land my first run exactly how I wanted. The first run that had gone to plan in the last year. I was sitting just outside of the qualifying placing so I cranked up the second run and landed that one too. Perfectly.

Unfortunately this still wasn't enough and I ended up on the sidelines with my hands in my pockets, watching the show I wanted to be a part of. I finished in 17th place.

This was a tough one to swallow as that almost guaranteed the end of my season would be the next event. I wasn't going to leave this one up to chance. I didn't have anything to lose and was fired up to give it everything.

A nine hour train ride to Vienna and then two more hours by car to Slovakia brought me to the last event. Within a few hours of riding the course I was hooked. The course was feeling amazing, my tricks were working well, and crashes were minimal (other than the compulsory first crash to check you're still awake). I made it through qualifying and was lined up for my first finals run. Goggles on. Feet set. I stood up and let it roll. And it kept rolling through to the finish corral. That run landed me in 9th place. My best finish in the last two years.

After landing that run in Slovakia, I was proud, but the happiness faded quickly. A quote that I posted after New Zealand at the start of the season rang true.

"Win or Lose. Your still going to have to get back to work"

So back to work it was. I had laid all my best tricks on the line and it worked out. Back to the drawing board to think up some new ones. And that has brought me here. To Sweden, where I have spent the last four months doing just that. In a few months I'll get to unleash it all and lay down a new catalogue of moves that I hope can help me reach the mirage I've been chasing since day one.