Before I knew about North Shore or any proper skills training we were putting bricks and bits of wood up in the garden to create ramps for jumps. We were just being kids playing outside with no direction or plan, it was just something to do, but it enabled me to build a solid skills base. People can miss that these days. If they get pushed into racing too early it becomes very serious, whereas for us it was all about fun, at least until those early races…
I started racing in 1993 when I was around 15 in the early days of Downhill in the UK. In fact I started doing a few dual slaloms. One summer I went to the Malvern Hills Classic, which was right on my doorstep and won the slalom competing against the best female bike riders in the country. Everyone was like ‘Who are you, where are you from?’ It wasn’t until the following year, at the same event, when the same thing happened again, that I thought I’d give racing a proper go.