The 3rd cat race this morning on the Dunsfold road circuit was always going to be hard in such inclement conditions, but I made it really really hard for myself. After getting up at 6am yesterday (thats pretty early by my student standards you know!) to train before I went to a wedding in Essex
, plus the late night and perhaps a little too much booze, getting up at 6.30am this morning was not pleasant. Let alone when I looked out the window. For a brief moment I did consider going back to bed!!But I'm glad I didn't. During the week I had been told when racing in the wet, to race hard. With this in mind, I had a little recconaisance drive around the course as I actually got there a few minutes early for once. Considering the rain, there wasn't as much standing water as I feared there might be. This course is definately better surface than the Kirdford circuit last Sunday, but there were still some challenging areas. Firstly there was a section on the course that was very muddy, perfect for spending the rest of the day picking the grit out of your eyes. As well as this there was also a lovely stream cris-crossing the road on a downhill S-bend. Excellent I thought, theres a place to test peoples nerves...
After a feeble attempt at a warmup, I had a chat with Paul T who had his ready made excuse of 200 miles in two days for when he got dropped. In actual fact he used the old ''my saddle slipped backwards'' when it came to it
Matt D was also present again continuing to learn his road racing craft... and quite well so far. We had the briefing and off we went, very short neutralised section this week, only about a kilometer. Not enough for me to warm up at all! So the opening few miles of racing were a bit of a wake up, but I soon got going. Going enough to hit the front at the afore mention S-bend and line the 60 strong peloton out in single file. People were already bottling it, when I looked over my shoulder there there were already gaps opening up. But I was merely testing the water, I had no intention of really taking off so early on... Until, the next time round. A few guys had the same idea and the peloton was duly strung out again. This time, there were big gaps, I pushed hard and held the wheel of the eventual winner, and we got up to the first pair of riders. Then one more rider came up to us. I was in fifth wheel at this point, I looked over my shoulder to see what the gap was like, and it was big. I was going to go through to help pull it out further, but the guy on the front had other ideas. He literally sat on the front of the break and drove it along at never much less than about 27mph, madness. The next time I looked over my shoulder the peloton was well out of sight!Eventually the guy moved off the front and we started working a bit more together, although throughout the race we never really clicked as a break. We never quite got a real rythm going, but it was fairly smooth so it was ok. Before too long five became four as the Brighton Mitre rider either got dropped, or went back to the bunch as he thought the break was too early too succeed. The thought did cross my mind over the first couple of breakaway laps as the strong man continued to put in huge turns on the front and before we knew it, the marshalls and a cycling spectator were reporting we were already a minute clear with about 4 of 8 laps to run (we went clear after 2 of 8 laps). It later transpired that the man in the yellow jacket cyclin the opposite direction to us was the Dad of on of my fellow escapee's.
So we plugged away the four of us together, each lap we seemed to have grown our lead slightly getting up to around the 1min 30s mark. Having gone clear so early on, I couldn't believe that we were looking like staying clear. I'd never stayed away in a break before so I really was in uncharted territory. The one thing I knew was that my sprint was going to be of little effect today, I was giving it everything contributing to the break so the finale was going to be anyone's guess... In about lap four, after going through the muddy section, the rain had temporarily eased. Thus not washing my glasses clear, I had to ditch them. It was gonna be a squint and bear it day! By the finish everyone looked like they'd just completed a very muddy Paris - Roubaix, nice!
Apart from that the race seemed to go relatively smoothly in the break, we all just kept working hard and kept gaining time. I began to see that I would have been a fool to return to the bunch previously, and if thats what the Brighton Mitre rider did, I bet he's kicking himself now! So the four of us were... Me, a ShavedLegs.co.uk rider, a Velocity bikes rider and an In-Gear Development rider, who looked pretty tasty. He was never shirking turns and seemed to be a little too comfortable. With hind sight I didn't do enough about that until it was too late, but there you go, lesson learnt...
We got to the last lap, and Mr ShavedLegs.co.uk, who had previously done the mammoth turns to establish the break... got dropped. Which was a shame, he deserved to at least stay with us to the finish, but thats racing I guess. So four became three, then Mr Velocity attacked... I looked at the In-Gear rider (can't remember his name! oops) and said, lets work together to hold him about 50m ahead and let him tire himself. He agreed, and thats what we did. But unfortunately our tempo riding soon brought us back up to his wheel anyway. Suprisingly the three of us continued to work well up to the last corner. Where you turn onto what is effectovely the finish straight but still about 3-4km from the finish, but throughout the race the wind had began to pick up strength and was now very strong indeed. Here's where I lost the race... I went through to work... doh! Bad move!
So I worked for about 800m when the Velocity rider attacked, with the In-Gear rider leaping straight on his wheel. It was a classic move, almost straight off of Eurosport. But I was done over, big style! I just couldn't grab their wheels. I was only about 50m behind, but with the wind I just couldn't get back up to them. So I had a great view of those two fight it out... The In-Gear rider then duly attacked and dropped the Velocity man on the finishing hill and cruised over the line to take a well deserved victory. Velocity second, and me 3rd. And I do believe our former break away companion Mr ShavedLegs.co.uk held off the bunch for 4th. I can't really complain, If anything I was perhaps a little stronger than the Velocity man, but I'm not going to argue over one place! But the In-Gear rider thoroughly deserved the victory, he was certainly strongest.
Overall I'm really pleased with the result, it's my thrid podium of 2008 and puts me on 31 points. Only 9 to go... Unfortunately I have little to report of the Acc finsher Matts ride, I only saw him for a little while at the end. Sounded like he came close to getting up there in the points again, I'm sure it's only a matter of time until he does. And as I mentioned Paul T didn't finish, but in fairness, he has done a lot of riding this weekend, even if his saddle really did slip back!
So I finally made the decisive break, and to a certain extent I even helped instigate it which is really cool too. I'll be glad when I finally get my 2nd cat licence so I can purely concentrate on racing again and not on points. Hopefully by then they'll be racking up anyhow. One things for sure, despite the crap weather I really enjoyed today, not so much at the time, but after the finish line I was buzzing. To get away in a break, ride 6 of 8 seven mile laps in a group of just 4 and stay well clear is really satisfying! What were the other 56 riders doing!? The beer this evening really tastes sweet I can assure you!For the power heads out there, I smashed some of my records today, and boy do my legs feel like they did too!
10mins at 327w
30mins at 309w
60mins at 296w
120mins at 277w
Average power for 85km: 266w, Oh and an average HR of 179, for 2hrs 21mins!!
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