I’m Jenson Young, a professional cyclist, living in Hemingfield.

I’m racing on gravel all over the world and over the coming months I will be writing about the adventures for the Chronicle.

Turnhout, Belgium

Last weekend was my first race with my new team Ribble Outliers and only my second ever gravel race.

It was two x 72km laps on flat Belgian gravel, at the UCI World Series gravel race starting and finishing in Turnhout.

I’d like to say I’ve got plenty of experience in the cycling world, but gravel is completely new to me so I had to rely on my teammates who have had much more experience to answer any questions I had and help get my bike set up perfectly for the race.

Having rode the course the day before the race I was familiar with the lap, also aware that this type of course doesn’t suit the terrain I prefer, so I was expecting the worst but hoping for the best.

I had set myself a goal of placing in the top 25.

On paper this doesn’t look great, however on a course that doesn’t suit my strengths, in my second ever gravel race against 100 of the world’s top professional gravel cyclists I thought this was pretty realistic and something I would be happy with.

Race day

I felt like I had prepared perfectly, 24psi (Pound Per Square Inch) in my front and rear 45mm tyres and pockets full of gels, and the sun was out.

At 8.30am we started. A fast chaotic start for the first 20km, the race strung out and visibility was minimal from the dust that was kicked up from everyone’s tyres. I was ready for it to be hard but not this hard!

At the end of the first lap the race settled down, about 40 riders left in the front group so a big selection had been made with the best riders and I found myself here.

At about 100km the race hit a hard sandy section where some riders pushed on the pace, this split the group in half and I was at the right side of the split still feeling good.

However after this effort I felt some signs of my legs and even my arms and hands cramping from the constant bumps and braking.

A hot day with not enough water and a lot of carbs made me feel extremely thirsty, looking back now I think I over fuelled with carbs and dehydrated myself by not having enough water (so that is definitely something to work on with the team and nutritionists before the next one).

At about 7km to go my body hit a bit of a wall, I couldn’t hold the wheel in front of me, and I lost contact with the front group, I knew I wasn’t far from the finish so I just had to give everything on my own until I got to the line.

I managed to catch one other rider who had also being dropped from the group shortly after me so we struggled together until the finish still trying to keep a high pace, where I ended up finishing 20th.

Overall I was really pleased with my condition and my result on a course that I would have normally accepted a poor result.

The race ended up being 39kph average speed for 3hours 39minutes.

The result qualified me to race in the UCI gravel elite world champs for GB later this year.

I’ll be in Italy this weekend and hoping to build on a solid start.

If you have any questions for Jenson, send them in to: ashley.ball@barnsley-chronicle.co.uk

You can follow Jenson’s instagram at: @jenson__young