Well, thats it for the road racing season for this year. My final race was the Doncaster Wheelers Autumn Road Race that took place in Harworth.
I got into the break after 1 lap with 3 other people and stayed there for the next 45 miles, the longest break I have ever been in. Anyway, we got reeled back in. Im saying that we had to slow down or stop when cars, on 3 occasions, got in front of the lead vehicle , but whats done is done. I wouldnt have won anyway because after 35 miles I was missing my turns at the front I was that knackered, and I was reduced to grovelling at the back of the line.
When we got caught, I was reduced to grovelling at the back of the bunch, but before the last hill I managed to get roughly somewhere towards the front.
At 300m to go, my legs where drowning in lactic acid and shut down. I came a miserable 30th, but, at least I had a nice days riding in the sun.
Looking back on the year, I have mixed feeling about my results. I manged to archieve one main goal, to get my 2nd catergory license, but failed on my other one, to win at least one race. Some might say that I'm being a bit of a twat, but I did come close to winning a few, I just messed up royaly or got outwitted in the closing metres.
Also, I got lots of top 10's and a handful of podiums, not bad to say that all I'd done previously was a couple of races at Richard Dunnes because I had a road bike laying about.
For the rest of the year, Im going to keep my legs ticking over by partaking in the short, but painful, hill climb season, culminating in the Nationals somewhere towards Manchester.
When thats done, I shall use the cross bike to do a few cyclo-cross races, and see what the fuss is about. Thats the plan anyway.
Because I probably wont have much to say after all thats done, I might do some reviews on various cycle gear, since Im going to have to built my winter bike (courtesy of Lee), improve the 'cross bike (its the frankenstein of bikes) and upgrade my race bike (courtesy of Joel) , theres going to be a few shiny new bike bits being used.
Well thats all for now, Ill put some reports and results from any competitive events I do up here and my plans for next year closer toward january.
Thanks for reading.
Monday, 3 October 2011
Sunday, 11 September 2011
Richard Hoyland Memorial and Out Of The Saddle Road Race
Richard Hoyland Memorial Road Race
My first road race (or one that I managed to finish) after Poland was the Richard Hoyland Memorial Road Race over towards Doncaster. Starting late for a road race and in light drizzle, the race navigated its way around a 3-sided circuit roughly 4.5km per revolution, 16 times, coming to a total of around 55miles.
First half of the race not a lot happened. People attacked and got brought back in. More people attacked and got brought back in.
Eventually a trio of riders got away, and stayed away. Towards the last few laps, a more determined chase brought the time gap down from 30 seconds to 17.
Few 3 laps to go, I decided to try my luck at bridging to the break.
A sneaky attack on a corner managed to break the elastic and I got away. All was going fine until I got midway into no-mans-land. Now, every bridge attemptee hates the scenario. You attack, your making great progress. Get half way. And run out of steam.
After realizing that I was not going to get any further, I sat up and waited to be swept up by the peleton.
My plan after the failed bridge was to sit nicely in the middle of the bunch, recover and attempt the final sprint. This didnt go quite as planned because just before one of the corners, a large farm vehicle decided to venture onto the course in the wrong direction. I didnt mind have to partake in filtering a 30-mph 5-abreast peleton into single-file 10mph. What I did mind was having to chase the split until I was breathing out of my unmentionables. Luckily, I managed to latch back onto the first group.
The final sprint was a bit hairy. At 400m somebody came down and at 300m someones pedal went into someones back wheel, effectively turning it into a huge, inedible pringle.
At 200m I was 3rd in line, boxed in. After a short discussion with my captor, I was freed, then fired up all cylinders and won the bunch sprint, with 5th overall.
Out Of The Saddle Road Race
I only need one word to describe this race - HARD!!
To put things slightly into perspective, I did my first 2/3/4 cat race after a winter of training and got 21st. I did this race 3 weeks after a month in Poland, so I went into the race knowing that I was going to burn.
Held in patchy sunlight on a 3-point-something kilometre rolling circuit, in the following 2 hours we would cover just shy of 60 mile.
Attacks went almost straightaway, but didnt really lead onto anything. Halfway into the endeavour, a certain machine called David Shackleton attacked, and quickly established a minute on the bunch. He was steaming along so much that his dad told him to slow up a bit so that a duo of chasers could bridge.
Another 9-man chase group followed, and then the group that I was in.
Things pretty much stayed like that till the end. Sprinting uphill out of most corners was the hardest. Sprinters like me arn't supposed to sprint during the race. Thats why Cavendish has a lead-out train. Not only does it set a high pace to discourage attacking, but it also maintains a constant effort, therefore saving Cavendish's fast-twitch muscle fibres till he needs them- in the last 200m.
So 2 hours, 60 miles and 75 sprints later, knackered would be an understatment. Non-the-less, I dug deep and managed to last till the flamme rouge. I tried to latch on over the crest off a small hill but to no avail.
I did a little sprint for the spectators, before rolling up to the side off the road, getting off the bike and lying on the pavement for a good 5 minutes while I wondered about the meaning of life, and why I race bicycles.
Thats all for the time being. Ive got my last road race next sunday, the Doncaster Wheelers Autumn Road Race.
I must go now, the smell of fried Gołąbki is wafting up from the kitchen.
My first road race (or one that I managed to finish) after Poland was the Richard Hoyland Memorial Road Race over towards Doncaster. Starting late for a road race and in light drizzle, the race navigated its way around a 3-sided circuit roughly 4.5km per revolution, 16 times, coming to a total of around 55miles.
First half of the race not a lot happened. People attacked and got brought back in. More people attacked and got brought back in.
Eventually a trio of riders got away, and stayed away. Towards the last few laps, a more determined chase brought the time gap down from 30 seconds to 17.
Few 3 laps to go, I decided to try my luck at bridging to the break.
A sneaky attack on a corner managed to break the elastic and I got away. All was going fine until I got midway into no-mans-land. Now, every bridge attemptee hates the scenario. You attack, your making great progress. Get half way. And run out of steam.
After realizing that I was not going to get any further, I sat up and waited to be swept up by the peleton.
My plan after the failed bridge was to sit nicely in the middle of the bunch, recover and attempt the final sprint. This didnt go quite as planned because just before one of the corners, a large farm vehicle decided to venture onto the course in the wrong direction. I didnt mind have to partake in filtering a 30-mph 5-abreast peleton into single-file 10mph. What I did mind was having to chase the split until I was breathing out of my unmentionables. Luckily, I managed to latch back onto the first group.
The final sprint was a bit hairy. At 400m somebody came down and at 300m someones pedal went into someones back wheel, effectively turning it into a huge, inedible pringle.
At 200m I was 3rd in line, boxed in. After a short discussion with my captor, I was freed, then fired up all cylinders and won the bunch sprint, with 5th overall.
Out Of The Saddle Road Race
I only need one word to describe this race - HARD!!
To put things slightly into perspective, I did my first 2/3/4 cat race after a winter of training and got 21st. I did this race 3 weeks after a month in Poland, so I went into the race knowing that I was going to burn.
Held in patchy sunlight on a 3-point-something kilometre rolling circuit, in the following 2 hours we would cover just shy of 60 mile.
Attacks went almost straightaway, but didnt really lead onto anything. Halfway into the endeavour, a certain machine called David Shackleton attacked, and quickly established a minute on the bunch. He was steaming along so much that his dad told him to slow up a bit so that a duo of chasers could bridge.
Another 9-man chase group followed, and then the group that I was in.
Things pretty much stayed like that till the end. Sprinting uphill out of most corners was the hardest. Sprinters like me arn't supposed to sprint during the race. Thats why Cavendish has a lead-out train. Not only does it set a high pace to discourage attacking, but it also maintains a constant effort, therefore saving Cavendish's fast-twitch muscle fibres till he needs them- in the last 200m.
So 2 hours, 60 miles and 75 sprints later, knackered would be an understatment. Non-the-less, I dug deep and managed to last till the flamme rouge. I tried to latch on over the crest off a small hill but to no avail.
I did a little sprint for the spectators, before rolling up to the side off the road, getting off the bike and lying on the pavement for a good 5 minutes while I wondered about the meaning of life, and why I race bicycles.
Thats all for the time being. Ive got my last road race next sunday, the Doncaster Wheelers Autumn Road Race.
I must go now, the smell of fried Gołąbki is wafting up from the kitchen.
Saturday, 20 August 2011
The Last Month
This is my first post since, well, my last post a month ago and blog viewer-age has drastically dropped because of it. However, this is what I've been doing for the last four weeks.
Week 1:
The day after Le Tour ended, I jetted off to Poland to visit family and to do any work that needed doing. I was presented with a heavily equipped town bike that would be my main port of call for training for the remainder of the trip.
Make: Unknown
Model: Unknown
Brake Type: Single Pivot
Brake Make: Unknown
Cranks: Unknown
Drivetrain: 5 speed Shimano Positron
Wheels: Unknown
Age: Have a guess
Weight: Couldn't find a scale big enough
Other: Dynamo w/ front and rear lights, full mudguards, spring saddle with suspension seatpost, luggage rack/seat, buckled wheels, loose headset, stand.
Me, being ever resourceful, thought I would make life easy for myself and brought other a few tools and spares, to make the bike a bit more cosy.
In my magic bike bag where, Sram Gripshit, full cable kit, quickrelease front axle and Shimano SPD pedals, which I quickly transeferred onto my bomb-proof steed.
Handle-bars where a bit more tricky, but I tried a variety of different postions until I found one that let me almost replicate drops.
With this set-up, I could terrorise the rural Polish population to my hearts content.
Week 2:
The villagers seem to have gotten wind that there was someone that could fix their pre-war nags for free, so I spent half the week fixing their bikes. I was surprised to see ovalised chainrings on one. I tried to swap them but they where welded to the crank.
The other half of the week I spent eating, sleeping and pooing, inbetween bike ride to various places far away. I always got lost but somehow managed to find a loop everytime.
Week 3:
Poland is a very agricultural country, with just over 40% of available land being arable. We live in the rural south-east and own a fair chunk of land, which all needed to be harvested when I was there. So, off I went across the Polish country-side bombing round in one of the three tractors that they use; the German 'Zetor', the Bellarussian 'Belarus' and the Italian 'Lamborghini'.
Then, when I got to the designated field, I pulled up, hopped out and sealed the two-ton grain trailer I was towing, hopped back in the tractor to escape various blood-sucking insects and played on my phone for three hours. The combine harvester came every half hour, dumped its load and off it went for another circuit of mentioned designated field.
Occsionally, a deer or two would run past the stationary tractor with a family of storcks pecking obsessively at the newly harvested ground behind the behemoth of the combine.
Week 4:
More or less the same as week 3, but I got to visit Przemyśl. This ancient town was once surrounded by Europes third largest fortress, which was purposefully destroyed when it was being surrended to the Russians in 1915. It is a ring of 44 forts in a circle of 45km in diameter, with most forts being open to the public in various states of ruin.
The town itself is very old with every second building being an Archcathedral of various donimations.
Week 1:
The day after Le Tour ended, I jetted off to Poland to visit family and to do any work that needed doing. I was presented with a heavily equipped town bike that would be my main port of call for training for the remainder of the trip.
Make: Unknown
Model: Unknown
Brake Type: Single Pivot
Brake Make: Unknown
Cranks: Unknown
Drivetrain: 5 speed Shimano Positron
Wheels: Unknown
Age: Have a guess
Weight: Couldn't find a scale big enough
Other: Dynamo w/ front and rear lights, full mudguards, spring saddle with suspension seatpost, luggage rack/seat, buckled wheels, loose headset, stand.
Me, being ever resourceful, thought I would make life easy for myself and brought other a few tools and spares, to make the bike a bit more cosy.
In my magic bike bag where, Sram Gripshit, full cable kit, quickrelease front axle and Shimano SPD pedals, which I quickly transeferred onto my bomb-proof steed.
Handle-bars where a bit more tricky, but I tried a variety of different postions until I found one that let me almost replicate drops.
With this set-up, I could terrorise the rural Polish population to my hearts content.
Week 2:
The villagers seem to have gotten wind that there was someone that could fix their pre-war nags for free, so I spent half the week fixing their bikes. I was surprised to see ovalised chainrings on one. I tried to swap them but they where welded to the crank.
The other half of the week I spent eating, sleeping and pooing, inbetween bike ride to various places far away. I always got lost but somehow managed to find a loop everytime.
Week 3:
Poland is a very agricultural country, with just over 40% of available land being arable. We live in the rural south-east and own a fair chunk of land, which all needed to be harvested when I was there. So, off I went across the Polish country-side bombing round in one of the three tractors that they use; the German 'Zetor', the Bellarussian 'Belarus' and the Italian 'Lamborghini'.
Then, when I got to the designated field, I pulled up, hopped out and sealed the two-ton grain trailer I was towing, hopped back in the tractor to escape various blood-sucking insects and played on my phone for three hours. The combine harvester came every half hour, dumped its load and off it went for another circuit of mentioned designated field.
Occsionally, a deer or two would run past the stationary tractor with a family of storcks pecking obsessively at the newly harvested ground behind the behemoth of the combine.
Week 4:
More or less the same as week 3, but I got to visit Przemyśl. This ancient town was once surrounded by Europes third largest fortress, which was purposefully destroyed when it was being surrended to the Russians in 1915. It is a ring of 44 forts in a circle of 45km in diameter, with most forts being open to the public in various states of ruin.
The town itself is very old with every second building being an Archcathedral of various donimations.
 |
| A view of Przemysl half way up |
 |
| A view of Przemysl at the top |
 |
| A big catherdral |
 |
| Another big cathedral |
 |
| Inside big cathedral |
Wednesday, 20 July 2011
Yorkshire Summer Circuit Series 4
I was third in this race, and with it brought a much sought after moral boost. Ive only been doing one race a week for a while now and I dont like it. In last weeks race I came a miserable fifteenth and with no road race on the weekend to try and make amends I had to wait a whole week.
Anyway, on tuesday it rained at Tockwith, a first for the circuit series. Me, knowing that crashes are a lot more likely in the wet stayed top 5 at all times, and after maybe 10 laps or so, I latched onto Rob Watsons wheel to try and chase down the lone breakaway rider. We pulled out a significant advantage and another rider came across to help us out. Us four riders worked solidly as a unit with each taking their share of pacemaking. I came second in the prime after a badly timed sprint, but quickly got back into the rythm. Towards the latter stages of the race, we had picked up such an advantage over the peleton that possibly we where chasing them instead of the other way round. At three to go, a rider attacked from the break and got away till the finish. I mistakedly thought that we would catch him and followed the wheel i was already on instead of going with him.
Last lap I let a little gap go hoping that the rider behind would chase it down and then I would be in the best position for the sprint. However, the rider I was behind was content with 4th place, so I had to drop it down into gear and cover maybe 25 meters in a space of a 100. I came third by a bike length.
My next race is the fabled Preston crit series that Ive heard so much about. This is the last race before I go to Poland for a bloody month and I only need 3 more points for my second catergory license. Thats 7th or better in the race.
Anyway, on tuesday it rained at Tockwith, a first for the circuit series. Me, knowing that crashes are a lot more likely in the wet stayed top 5 at all times, and after maybe 10 laps or so, I latched onto Rob Watsons wheel to try and chase down the lone breakaway rider. We pulled out a significant advantage and another rider came across to help us out. Us four riders worked solidly as a unit with each taking their share of pacemaking. I came second in the prime after a badly timed sprint, but quickly got back into the rythm. Towards the latter stages of the race, we had picked up such an advantage over the peleton that possibly we where chasing them instead of the other way round. At three to go, a rider attacked from the break and got away till the finish. I mistakedly thought that we would catch him and followed the wheel i was already on instead of going with him.
Last lap I let a little gap go hoping that the rider behind would chase it down and then I would be in the best position for the sprint. However, the rider I was behind was content with 4th place, so I had to drop it down into gear and cover maybe 25 meters in a space of a 100. I came third by a bike length.
My next race is the fabled Preston crit series that Ive heard so much about. This is the last race before I go to Poland for a bloody month and I only need 3 more points for my second catergory license. Thats 7th or better in the race.
Tuesday, 5 July 2011
Yorkshire Summer Circuit Series 2
Well, today I actually finished the race without having a chain or spoke snap on me. I also got a taste of big bunch sprinting, not a 10 rider chase to the line that I had previously taken part in.
We arrived at the venue just as the 3/4 cat race was finishing, and there was a guy on the floor on the first corner surrounded by paramedics. Broken collar bone apparently. The rain earlier on in the day must have drifted over the York plain and there were a few small puddles here and there, so cornering had to taken a bit softly.
The race got underway and there were attacks straight away. I settled into the constant surges of speed at 30mph that are so typical of circuit races Ive done this year. In fact, I went with most breakaway attempts but all were brought back. Eventually, after around 10 laps a group of 3 managed to get away, who were joined by another 4 later on. These 7 riders stayed away till the finish. Even after attacks every other lap from my group (mostly by me), and big turns at the front (I played my part), the gap didn't seem to be diminishing too quickly. A lack of cooperation in my group let the break succeed I guess. Eventually after 5 laps to go of the 1km circuit, it became evident that the break had beaten us fair and square, so any sprint was for the minor placings.
Coming into the last lap, the was a strange lull of speed at the bell, but as soon as this was noticed, attacks came from all directions, which were promptly caught and extinguished. At 500metres to go a few desperate riders launched their sprints, but this was used as a spring board into the last straight. After entering the last corner in around 10th position, I opened up my sprint and came across the line second in the bunch sprint (albeit by half a wheel) and 9th overall. A small 2 points go towards my 2nd category aspirations.
We arrived at the venue just as the 3/4 cat race was finishing, and there was a guy on the floor on the first corner surrounded by paramedics. Broken collar bone apparently. The rain earlier on in the day must have drifted over the York plain and there were a few small puddles here and there, so cornering had to taken a bit softly.
The race got underway and there were attacks straight away. I settled into the constant surges of speed at 30mph that are so typical of circuit races Ive done this year. In fact, I went with most breakaway attempts but all were brought back. Eventually, after around 10 laps a group of 3 managed to get away, who were joined by another 4 later on. These 7 riders stayed away till the finish. Even after attacks every other lap from my group (mostly by me), and big turns at the front (I played my part), the gap didn't seem to be diminishing too quickly. A lack of cooperation in my group let the break succeed I guess. Eventually after 5 laps to go of the 1km circuit, it became evident that the break had beaten us fair and square, so any sprint was for the minor placings.
Coming into the last lap, the was a strange lull of speed at the bell, but as soon as this was noticed, attacks came from all directions, which were promptly caught and extinguished. At 500metres to go a few desperate riders launched their sprints, but this was used as a spring board into the last straight. After entering the last corner in around 10th position, I opened up my sprint and came across the line second in the bunch sprint (albeit by half a wheel) and 9th overall. A small 2 points go towards my 2nd category aspirations.
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