we had about 7 people in the training group, made of matt ives making his long awaited return since like september!, big simon, 2 chaps from TNS, polish andrew, a chap i think i have seen once before in the summer, and me.
for most of the way the pace was not very high, only about 20mph average, but i was doing a lot of turns on the front so i felt about as tired as i usually do bieng dragged around by george, paul and co. i was not feeling fantastic though, my legs felt a bit sticky, and less energetic.
we were pretty steady through the lanes, i tried to do most of my turns up the hills to push myself. however i nearly got dropped when i was leading up the hills towards rusper, and simon puts in a dig, and i was already going as fast as i could! luckily managed to hang on.
we decided to do the long through and off, i was not sure at first but i thought i would do it anyway, and im pleased i did. simon lead us onto the deul carriage way and i came through and it went on from there, pretty steady at first. at this point i was getting a second wind of life--> the sun was out, i was warm, and my matabolism finally decided to wake up and let me burn some wheat-a-bix!
the through and off started to wind up , and up and up...to a crazy speed!...mostly done by simon. in the end we had lost polish andrew, i think matt ives though im not sure, and one of the TNS chaps, the other one was clinging on whilst me and simon hammered away at the front, it was pretty good funny actually. anyway one of the TNS chaps sorted us out and we re-grouped at the next round about. we kept a good through and off untill the sprint...
i was feeling fantastic for the sprint, but as i started to go (this time on the right corner for once) my cleat came out when i was at full acceleration, i wobbled rather alarmingly, and nearly came down!...matt ended up winning the sprint.
good ride back, me and simon rode off from the beggining away from the group and we kept a decent pace. after the church we set off as one big group again. up the drag someone put in a break which i managed to follow with paul george and matt on my wheel, then paul put in an attack, we dropped the original attacker, and matt george paul and i broke away for a fantastic storm back to coulsdon at 30 mph.
sorry to hear about the chap who broke his collar bone!
cheers,
stu