Friday 19 October 2007

Posted by Velouria Posted on 12:30 | 1 comment

Battered and Bruised

The weekend started off with a road race in Worcester. Not really my sort of race - far too flat with no hills what so ever to break up the bunch. There was a gravel section on a gradual climb, and I think most guys were waiting to make their moves there.

The bunch was quite lethargic, and I just couldn't sit in the bunch, and so launched several pointless attacks. I didn't really want to get away - it was going to be a long hard ride on my own, but I wanted to have a look to see if anybody else had similar ideas. On each occasion that I tried to get off the front, the yellow jersey would close me down by himself. That made me feel quite good - he obviously thought I was enough of a threat to warrant closing me down.

The big move did happen on the gravel section, and I probably went a little early, and as a result got dropped on the incline. Nine riders got away with a 20 second gap, with 15 riders forming the chasing bunch. In 20kms we only took 10 seconds
off them. I think a couple of factors were to blame - some teams not really prepared to chase (like Maverick, as we had a rider in the break), and the general inexperience of some of the riders when it came to riding a pace line.

It ended up being a sprint for 10th position, where I got 12th. Not too bad.

Sunday

Wow - I never noticed this view when I was riding.

The Apple Blossom. I thought the plan was to ride with the ladies today, but my dear Epic partner had other ideas. The race started slowly as we entered some single track just after the start and it got quite congested. Once we got out onto the farm roads, Craig decided to set the pace, and that was the last time I was in front of him. He towed me around Paul Cluver Estate for about 2 hours - inflicting serious pain. At one point my nose started bleeding, but I didn't get much sympathy. I can't recall much about the race - I just see Craig's rear wheel in my memory. We did come across a herd of cows that were running obstruction for the leaders. Craig had great fun herding them out of the way, while I took the time to recover slightly - to catch my breath, and wipe away some of the blood.

Amazing - you can't see my tongue dragging on the ground.

I hope the Epic isn't going to be 8 days of this. While I was on the limit, it looked like Craig still had quite a bit left in the tank. This is possibly revenge for Lourendsford and Citrusdal.
Categories:

1 comment :

  1. nice pics again dude, and if Craig wasn't riding Sat then you have an excuse, even if you only managed 12th tehee...

    ReplyDelete