Birmingham stage race was split into a 10 mile TT in the morning and a crit at the Stourport circuit in the afternoon. I knew I’d do ok in the TT, even on my road bike and was aiming for top 10 in that with top 5 for the overall.
I had a certain wattage in mind for the TT but with such an undulating course I really struggled to get the power out. I think I got it out in the right places and managed to get 10th, even overtaking one of the Bottrill boys with a full TT set up and disk.
Going into the crit, there was some fatigue in the legs but not too much to begin with. There were two sets of bonus seconds available, for a prime and for the win (30, 20 and 10 for 1st 2nd 3rd). After a surprisingly fast first 20 minutes and with no break up the road the whistle for the prime lap went. I was in maybe 15th place but moved swiftly to the front and attacked with half a lap to go, immediately gapping the pack. I drove it but was caught with 20 m to go by one rider, to take 20 bonus seconds.
Having done a significant effort for the prime I eased up, just as three riders attacked... I knew it was going to stick but hadn’t recovered enough to follow.
With teammates ahead two teams just marked everything and disrupted the chase. I was getting quite frustrated and appeared to be wasting my efforts so slotted in for a bit with the break getting up to 20 seconds lead at some points.
With 4 laps to go, the break was in sight but almost out of touch. Suddenly three riders got off the front, naturally I missed it. Next lap another rider went solo. I waited patiently for one more lap before attacking and gapping the peloton who was too tired to chase. I committed, caught the solo rider within half a lap. We worked for half a lap before finally catching the second group of riders. It was a bit touch and go, but the original break was flagging and finally with half a lap to go we brought them back as well making it an 8 rider break.
By this point I was almost spent, my leg started to cramp with the effort but I kept in touch and came 7th. My groupwas maybe 10-15 seconds ahead of the bunch, so combined with my TT time and prime I pulled out a decent 5thplace. Good day out.
Well done to Owen and Will for their first race, Doug for his first point, Sam for getting to Cat 3 and Jamie for racingwith a broken arm!
I had a certain wattage in mind for the TT but with such an undulating course I really struggled to get the power out. I think I got it out in the right places and managed to get 10th, even overtaking one of the Bottrill boys with a full TT set up and disk.
Going into the crit, there was some fatigue in the legs but not too much to begin with. There were two sets of bonus seconds available, for a prime and for the win (30, 20 and 10 for 1st 2nd 3rd). After a surprisingly fast first 20 minutes and with no break up the road the whistle for the prime lap went. I was in maybe 15th place but moved swiftly to the front and attacked with half a lap to go, immediately gapping the pack. I drove it but was caught with 20 m to go by one rider, to take 20 bonus seconds.
Having done a significant effort for the prime I eased up, just as three riders attacked... I knew it was going to stick but hadn’t recovered enough to follow.
With teammates ahead two teams just marked everything and disrupted the chase. I was getting quite frustrated and appeared to be wasting my efforts so slotted in for a bit with the break getting up to 20 seconds lead at some points.
With 4 laps to go, the break was in sight but almost out of touch. Suddenly three riders got off the front, naturally I missed it. Next lap another rider went solo. I waited patiently for one more lap before attacking and gapping the peloton who was too tired to chase. I committed, caught the solo rider within half a lap. We worked for half a lap before finally catching the second group of riders. It was a bit touch and go, but the original break was flagging and finally with half a lap to go we brought them back as well making it an 8 rider break.
By this point I was almost spent, my leg started to cramp with the effort but I kept in touch and came 7th. My groupwas maybe 10-15 seconds ahead of the bunch, so combined with my TT time and prime I pulled out a decent 5thplace. Good day out.
Well done to Owen and Will for their first race, Doug for his first point, Sam for getting to Cat 3 and Jamie for racingwith a broken arm!