SSSCCRRL 2016 Reports
Posted: 06 May 2016 16:40
Round 1:
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Nice weather for a change, about 18c with clear skies and a light breeze. Both myself and Laurence were in group 1, so started in the first wave on the Knighton course which is one of the faster ones. The first few laps were fast with myself and Laurence doing the majority of the work with about another 4 guys, no-one else seemed interested in doing any turns and despite indicating that we needed to get a thru and off going they defaulted to klingon mode...just riding the wheels. Luckily us guys at the front did good turns and kept the pace high, enough to shell some out the back and hold off the chasing groups until the last lap. I went for a 2-up breakaway when a rider from West Mids Police cycling team jumped off the front. I figured it was worth a try as the rest of our group didn't seem organised to chase. Unluckily for us they were caught by groups 2 & 3, so reeled us in within 3/4 of a lap. We hung at the front until the last lap when we were caught by the faster groups (4 & 5). I sprinted up the outside up to the front to get into the tight 1st turn first as it's tight and has a few nasty potholes. Unfortunately I got swamped on the back straight, lost contact with the front and then got caught behind a crash (Laurence too) caused by a touch of wheels. I saw at least 2 riders on the deck. I didn't crash but was forced to slow so much the lead group was 100m up the road by the time I got going again. This signalled race over, so I just rode in at tempo to finish out a good race overall.
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Nice weather for a change, about 18c with clear skies and a light breeze. Both myself and Laurence were in group 1, so started in the first wave on the Knighton course which is one of the faster ones. The first few laps were fast with myself and Laurence doing the majority of the work with about another 4 guys, no-one else seemed interested in doing any turns and despite indicating that we needed to get a thru and off going they defaulted to klingon mode...just riding the wheels. Luckily us guys at the front did good turns and kept the pace high, enough to shell some out the back and hold off the chasing groups until the last lap. I went for a 2-up breakaway when a rider from West Mids Police cycling team jumped off the front. I figured it was worth a try as the rest of our group didn't seem organised to chase. Unluckily for us they were caught by groups 2 & 3, so reeled us in within 3/4 of a lap. We hung at the front until the last lap when we were caught by the faster groups (4 & 5). I sprinted up the outside up to the front to get into the tight 1st turn first as it's tight and has a few nasty potholes. Unfortunately I got swamped on the back straight, lost contact with the front and then got caught behind a crash (Laurence too) caused by a touch of wheels. I saw at least 2 riders on the deck. I didn't crash but was forced to slow so much the lead group was 100m up the road by the time I got going again. This signalled race over, so I just rode in at tempo to finish out a good race overall.