Monday, March 02, 2009

Back on the road

I did my first road race on Saturday, the San Fairy Ann crits at Hog Hill in Essex. Actually, is it in Essex or London? I'll have to look that up.
Either way, it's just about close enough to ride there so we (Andy Eagles, Simon Bird and me) rode over from Dulwich. It took an hour and twenty minutes at an easy pace on horrible roads, but at least we made it - more than can be said for our teamate Kevin who tried to drive and got stuck in traffic.
The race was ok. I got round and came 14th which is not too bad, but not amazing either. I need to lose a bit of weight before I'm going to be competitive on the hill there - it's a real killer, especially when you have to ride up it every 2.5minutes. Ouch.
Andy Eagles rode really well to come 7th after riding agressively all race - chapeau!
The corners at Hog Hill are great, as is the surface which is really smooth and grippy - perfect for just letting off the brakes and going really fast. Next time, hopefully I'll put my cornering skills to good use off the front of the bunch rather than trying to get back on after losing touch on the climb.
Next week it's the Jock Wadley Memorial Road Race around my old stomping ground, Colchester in Essex. I'm predicting 135km of windsept misery as the big guns show off to each other. I'm not looking froward to it one bit.

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