Oli Beckingsale, leading British rider in men's cross-country mountain biking, is writing a diary for BBC Sport during this year's Mountain Bike & Trials World Championships.

In his first entry, he outlines his preparation and his targets, and looks ahead to next year's Olympics.

The days are counting down and now it’s only 10 days to the biggest MTB race of the year and my season’s goal, the World Championships. The Worlds are the main event of the MTB calendar and for us Brits this year they are even more important as they are taking place on home soil at Fort William in Scotland.

Fort William has hosted a round of the World Cup for the last four years and all the disciplines are racing this year: cross-country, downhill, four-cross and trials. I’m a cross-country racer and am competing on Saturday, 8 September, racing against 150 other senior men over six laps of the 7km course, which should take about two hours.

The course for the Champs is newly designed and basically boils down to a long 10-minute climb to the high point and then a long technical drop back home. There was a test event on the course back in May and I think the circuit was an improvement for the riders and also the spectators, as the racing is closer to the arena. I managed to win this event as well so that was good for my confidence.

Over the last two seasons I have found my best condition and improved at a World level with a few top-10s and a silver at the Commonwealth Games. Every athlete hopes for each year to be the best yet but for me this season has been the most difficult in a while with bad health affecting my training and racing.

But I have cracked on with it and over the last two months have improved, and coming into the Championships I think I am back to a decent level, having won a big race in Hungary two weeks ago, so I am positive about my chances of making the top 10.

The race for the title is going to be as competitive as ever, and the man of the moment is Frenchman Julien Absalon the current Olympic and World Champ; he has been on fire again this year and is hot favourite. Also in the hunt will be the Swiss Christophe Sauser and the crazy Spaniard, Jose Antonio Hermida.

Everyone already has their eyes on next year’s big event - the Olympic Games, where MTB will feature for the fourth time. Having competed in the last two Games, I hope to be on the start line in Beijing and hopefully I have got all my bad luck out of the way this year and I will be fast enough to ride near the front.

You can find out more about me on my website, and don't forget to check out the mountain biking section of the BBC Sport Cycling community on isporty.com.

If there's anything you'd like to know about mountain biking or the Worlds, let me know by adding a comment below.

Read Oli's second diary entry.