By Wednesday the pits had transformed into a World Cup site and riders were beginning to show up. It was great to have been here for a week already as I was already used to the humidity and I had already ridden the track so I was able to conserve some energy during the run up to the race. They made a few alterations to the track from the national, just adding an extra line at the top and putting in a few extra corners and lines here and there, otherwise it was pretty much the same.

Practice took place on Thursday and by Thursday afternoon it was already time for timed practice. This year the world cup schedule has been changed slightly and we now qualify the day before the race, and just have one race run on the Sunday. For this race it was actually qualifying on Friday, so you had to be up to speed pretty quick.

I worked on a few sections that I hadn