About this project

I've been cycling for more than 20 years now and I've been into photography in the last 10 years, but I didn't know much about cyclo-cross until two years ago. I went to see a World Cup race and it was love at first sight - I fell in love with the sport: the pace, the riders' technical skills and the whole atmosphere of the races were amazing, almost overwhelming.

A year later, I decided, that I'll follow the World Cup circus through the season and be a chronicler of the heroes of this (outside of a handful of countries) little-known discipline of cycling. The only problem I had was that I didn't have any assignments from magazines or contact in the sport - I was an outsider. So I booked all the tickets and accommodation for the season using my savings then the season started.

Cyclo-cross is a winter sport, the season starts in early October and lasts until mid-February - in other words, riders get the worst of the weather, for months. The same applied to everybody else: fans, supporters, mechanics and us, photographers. I was sitting in the mud or snow for hours but I loved every minute of it. I traveled over 8000 miles, spent most weekends on the road and after each race, I went to work on Monday. But I was happy to share the photos and my experiences on my blog (http://cyclephotos.co.uk) and on Facebook and Twitter and the response was overwhelming: cyclo-cross afficinados enjoyed immensely the photos and race reports: a little community started to form and I was humbled by their attention.

You could also ask: why am I different from any other photographer out there who takes photos of cyclo-cross riders? Most photographers become lazy after a while. I don't. Cyclo-cross races are short (within in an hour) and sweet but that is also very challenging for a photographer and not many other photographers make the effort to create something new, something unusual - and do that every other weekend. There are plenty of photographers with great vision in mountain biking and road cycling. But when it comes to cyclo-cross, it takes a lot of stamina and dedication to be creative and interesting - and that's where I come on.

The new season is about to begin and I would like to carry on bringing great imagery to people with whom I share the love of cyclo-cross. The raised amount would cover my travel expenses and it would allow me to go to all the World Cup races and most of the other important races, like the GVA's and the Superprestige races. Regardless of my day job, the updates would come in a timely fashion, right after the races.