Palace #1 20 april

[Sylv]

Where were the Addiscombe? Just me and George, whose new bike looked solid enough to withstand his power, and Bridget in the women's race. Massive field the E/1/2 was about 40 deep and the 3/4 twice that, a strong Pearsons contingent, two Sigmas, a strong Toachim guy plus the regulars. My plan was to take a back seat, watch the early attacks come and go and wait for the decisive ones, which usuallay come in the second half from the likes of Santoni, Paine or Knox. Thing is at times I had up to 20 or more riders in front of me, we talk about the "elastic effect" but I didn't think it would be that bad with the E/1/2 - it was. I was struggling at times to stay on wheels up the climb, so after a while I moved up and it was much better, though I was tired from my previous efforts to stay on. The pace was fast throughout with no "float" moments, apart from a couple times up the hills after an attack had been caught. I took one turn at the front to cover a solo attack by the aforementioned Santoni (who stayed away for a while but I think got caught), but that was it. The race was to be 20 laps but they cut it short by one with two to go, I think because of a crash in the 3/4. I was nicely tucked onto Bryan Taylor's wheel but someone got between us on the final downhill. Bryan kind of lauched his sprint from the bottom though, which I wasn't ready to follow! As we crested the top a guy on a shopping bike got in the way, and a few of us had a hard time not rear-ending him - he must have had the scare of his life. So my sprint was a bit delayed but I managed to scrap into the top ten behind a bunch of Elites and firsts, not sure what position I'll be given. George who had showed himself towards the front at the beginning was dropped but carried on, no doubt inspired by Mr Green - I hope his mind didn't wander. We averaged 41km/h - always astound me we manage that around that course.

Cats E/12/3
1 Bryan Taylor VC Londres E
2 Daniel Santoni Pearson Cycles E s/t
3 Stuart Spies London Dynamo 2
4 Ian Paine London Dynamo 1
5 Symon Lewis Sigma RT 1
6 Hugo Humpreys Mosquito Bikes 2
7 Kevin Knox Duwlich Paragon 1V

Cats 3/4s
1 Andrew Colvin Bigfoot 3
2 Bill Bell Gemini BC 3 s/t
3 Jason Green London Dynamo 3
4 Ben Jacobs London Dynamo 3
5 James Durbis London Dynamo 3
6 Jack Haining Sutton CC/De Ver 3
7 Patrick Scarboro Cycles Dauphin J3
8 Niz Hutchings CS Grupetto 4



Women

1 Maryka Sennema Kingston Whlrs 2
2 Claire Beaumont Rapha/Condor 2
3 Emma Patterson London Dynamo 2
4 Elise Sherwell Pearson Cycles 3
5 Mathilde Pauls Pearson Cycles 3
6 Emily Bagnall Kingston Whlrs 3
7 Tracy Corbett Rapha Condor 3
8 Emily Barnes Palmer Pk Velo Y
9 Anna Glowinski Mule Bar Girls 4
10 Lauren Whitmore London Dynamo 4
11 Dyanne Holland Dulwich Paragon 4
12 Emma Craddock Southdown Bikes -
13 Sabine Homrichaul Kingston Whlrs 4
14 Lydia Bolan London Dynamo 4
15 Astrid Winger London Phoenix 3/4
16 Vikki Filsell Pearson Cycles 4
17 Kate Butler Dulwich Paragon 4
18 Liz Rice London Phoenix 3
19 Bridget Malarkey Addiscombe CC 4
20 Rebecca Charlton Mulebar Girls 2
DNF Maria David Dulwich Paragon

[kieran]

[quote="Sylv"]Where were the Addiscombe?

[Snoop Doug]

Well done Bridget - keep it going

[David.Hilbert]

I'm confused. I don't think I've ever seen the words "George " and
" dropped" in the same sentence

[Sylv]

He promised to have his own back to me on Sunday

Maybe half the field got dropped.

[Snoop Doug]

[quote="David.Hilbert"]I'm confused. I don't think I've ever seen the words "George " and
" dropped" in the same sentence

[Andrew G]

I'd intended to come up Sylv, even if I'd just have kept George company in a 2up , but had to go to work sans bike so wouldn't be able to get there in time. All being well I shall debut my TT training - get dropped and then race solo - next week at the Addiscombe promotion.

Big fields I hope the 3/4 isn't too bad next week as there's sometimes the odd nutter gets in if it's a big field, memories of the bloke who kept getting dropped and then freewheeling round and jumping back in again of last year. I remember Kieran saying he'd got in his way as well at one point nearly causing a crash.

Well done to Maria and anyone else concerned in the promotion of the LWCR, looks like it's taken off very well judging by the size of the early fields. Mark's got a lot of ladies to chase on Sunday.

[Toks]

Nice one, Syv and great Job Bridget. Stick at it it's great training. The winner of the wormen's race report is here posting.php?mode=edit&f=4&p=101961

[Andrew G]

[quote="Women's race winner"]We came around the top corner and lo and behold, a dozen 3/4s all over the road pedalling like morons because they had been dropped (and likely lapped) ages ago, heading to the line. Seriously, if you've effectively stopped racing with a few laps to go, get off the @#$% track already!

[Bridget]

Ok, very short report, as I didn't have much of a race.

I was very nervous before and despite starting right at the front, dropped back a bit through not getting my foot in the pedal right away. Stayed with it round the bends but lost it on the hill on the first lap when most of the other riders came past me After that I rode around with Rebecca which was nice as she told me what to do when the scary bunches came past! At one point I thought we could have caught some stragglers ahead but we got held up every time the guys would pass on a bend. I found it really difficult to stand my ground whilst they were coming past, a couple of times had to slow almost to a stop to stay close enough to the edge. In this way, we fell further behind and were lapped by the front group twice.

Anyway, it wasn't as scary as I thought it would be, and I was encouraged that I could go round the bends easily as fast as the other women - just need to work on the hil

Thanks for your words of encouragement. It wasn't exactly hard to finish since I was just riding round at my own pace for most of it! I was surprised they let us finish actually and didn't pull us out as we had been lapped. Come to think of it - since we'd been lapped twice (the last time on the last lap) - we probably didn't finish.

[Marcus]

Well done Bridget. I'm sure you'll be even stronger on the CR come Saturday.

It must be the new bike why George was dropped. I'll do you a favour George, I'll give you £50 for it

[Robh]

[quote="Marcus"]Well done Bridget. I'm sure you'll be even stronger on the CR come Saturday.

It must be the new bike why George was dropped. I'll do you a favour George, I'll give you £50 for it

[quote="Robh"][quote="Marcus"]Well done Bridget. I'm sure you'll be even stronger on the CR come Saturday.

It must be the new bike why George was dropped. I'll do you a favour George, I'll give you £50 for it

[quote="-Adam-"][quote="Robh"][quote="Marcus"]Well done Bridget. I'm sure you'll be even stronger on the CR come Saturday.

It must be the new bike why George was dropped. I'll do you a favour George, I'll give you £50 for it

[-Adam-]

Have you ever seen a genuinely good rider who doesn't look cool?