SL - South Nutfield Handicap 6th May

[SteveSh]

Well i felt like death last night, i was really struggling just to even ride to the venue - which had its start/finish line moved.

Apparently the back part of the course was being resurfaced, god knows why as this is the only decent part of the course currently, so instead we had a 10lap race around the knackered pot-hole part, even the organisers were brushing all the stones from the corners it was that bad. The start/finish was in a really dangerous place, on a blind bend with loads of cars parked on it just after a single-lane bridge.

The group never really seemed to get organised, the Cat 3s had a incident with a wa**er local who kept driving his Land Rover at <20mph and cutting us up, his wing mirror even clipped me he was that close and then he got the real arse-ache when he was given victory salutes etc and threatened to use his car as a dodgem.

Lots of sandbagging going on and when the 1,2,3 group was together it was impossible to get near the front, everyone just sat in a massive group not moving.

Came to the last lap on the downhill and it started to speed up, unfortunately I was in the part of the pack where 2 people must have touched and about 20 riders went down. I braked that hard that i was pulling an endo and almost avoided it, but the t*ss pots behind me smashed right into me and it winded me really badly. There were some others way worst off though, at least 3 lying on the ground with blood on faces and holding arms/collarbones. I know its a race, but its hardly the TdF and I was really disappointed to see a lot of riders just fight their bikes out of the mess and ride off leaving others lying on the floor, they werent going to get a placing from it and i bet those that rode off included the ones who caused the crash in the first place.

So i now have no skin on my other hip, tyre burn marks all up my legs which makes sleeping impossible, and a hairline crack to the elbow. Oh and my new Kysrium SL Premiums are bent and may need new rims!!

Not a happy bunny, a really stupid course to run a handicap on in my book as it was virtually impossible to stay out of trouble with all the potholes and the narrow bridge.

[Sylv]

Oh man that's terrible, again! Hope it gets better. Shame you're not joining us for the NPS off-roading is much safer it sounds!

[SteveSh]

[quote="Sylv"]Oh man that's terrible, again! Hope it gets better. Shame you're not joining us for the NPS off-roading is much safer it sounds!

[Andrew G]

Holy cow, bad luck, and after such a good week last time out .
[quote]I know its a race, but its hardly the TdF and I was really disappointed to see a lot of riders just fight their bikes out of the mess and ride off leaving others lying on the floor, they werent going to get a placing from it and i bet those that rode off included the ones who caused the crash in the first place.

[Toks]

Ouch! oh blimey, I'm really sorry to hear what happened to you and the rest of the racers Steve. I hope things heal up quickly. I've never heard of a significant crash in the Surry League handicaps before that sounded horrendous. On [url=http://www.veloriders.co.uk/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=91750]Veloriders[/url] there's a thread about a big crash at Hillingdon. Mmm not the kinda thing you wanna here if you race or plan to race

[Marcus]

Have you thought about taking up wrestling, or cage fighting? Maybe safer than this road racing lark.

Still managed a good report and no sign of resting. Great to hear.

ps. Did you have your ACC jersey on?

[Keith]

Well that was a strange Handicap.

At no time did a chain-gang form! Despite this, it took the scratch group until 2 laps to go to catch us. Apparently they weren't working together either.

4 riders remained away up the road. On a 3 mile circuit. Guess what? According to reliable accounts (nice to see you Adam ), they were working really well together.

I was expecting the pace to go ballistic last time up the hill with the scratch group, but it didn't. I kept expecting it to go ballistic from then on, but it still didn't. I was at the sharp end as we passed through the narrow bridge and heard the carnage behind. Hope you return to 100% soon Steve. Also Dan G came off worse for wear. The Shadow kept out of trouble by being right up near the front, as usual. Kev was watching from the sidelines - mechanical?

[Jim B]

Keith is spot on.
I think about 4 people in my group (3rd off) did most of the work. Fair play to the 4 guys who put their heads down and went for it.
I was half expecting to go out the back given my lack of miles recently with doing the London marathon.
I can't work out why a lot of people don't want to get anywhere near the front. Like the above post said, it ain't the TdF. I don't really care where I finish, I just want to enjoy the race. A few digs etc. make it a bit of fun.
Apparently the guy who broke his collar bone had a nasty one and is due for an op on Monday. One of the organisers told me that he was a bit embarrassed as he went up the inside, hit a bridge and then brought a load down. That all happened behind me and I wasn't right at the front, so they were racing for 15th spot or something! Hardly worth running into a bridge at 30mph for.

[George]

I was in the second last group off which seemed to be made up of mostly Norwood Paragons. There wern't too many riders who wanted to ride on the front as said before, and the pace seemed slow, everytime I was on the front no one didn't seem to hold my wheel.

At around 5 laps to go Marcus Brueton and I attacked which strung the group out.

When we were caught by the scratch group with 2 to go Markus and I attacked again just for the hell of it to see what would happen. Everyone else seemed content to sit in for the bunch sprint for 4th or 5th place

Last lap I just got to the front felt strong and tried another attack with a mile to go, This upped the pace and I was on the front as lead out man coming down over the narrow bridge.
Good training felt good, really enjoyed the ride and happy with my new bike