7/02/10
This was myself and Sean Beatty's first race, both cat 4's and a little apprehensive but happy to be there. I met Sean on the line as I hadn't met him before the race, he knew who I was as I was the only rider in Medway Velo kit. The race was split for the different cats, and us 4's set off a few minutes after the higher cat's, nice easy start slightly uphill as we were riding anti-clockwise round the track. I thought the pace would have been a lot higher but for the first few laps it was fairly gentle, some surges up to 25 mph and one downland cycles rider shot off, nobody went after him though and he was caught later. The higher cats came through about halfway through the hour and a lap after that the chap in the pink WyndyMilla kit punctured, didn't have a spare wheel and tried to take one of Sean's spares I believe, but was stopped and he had a bit of a fit and didn't finish. As our bunch went round I found myself taking a quite a few turns on the front, felt good on it as the pace wasn't too high. Sean was always level with me or thereabouts in the bunch, taking turns on the front and pushing up the pace now and again.Just before the hour was up, 3 riders had got away and stayed away almost to the end when one of them seemed to be in trouble and was caught, we didn't see the other two again. After the hour had passed, the pace started to wind up, it got fairly hard on the run in to the line as there was a cross-wind blowing us about and it is slightly up hill and before I knew it we were into the last lap. The last lap came up fairly suddenly, everyone looking a bit cagey and no-one seemed willing to commit, I was cramping up, due to the fact I think of sitting on the front too much and doing a 12 hour night shift the night before, when Sean jumped and went off with about half a lap to go. he did really well, but was caught about 300 yards from the line as the group wound itself up and went in for a bunch sprint. I could not get out of the saddle due to cramps and was disappointed in the end. I don't think Sean placed it was hard to tell. So, we both really enjoyed it, think Sean is racing again on the 21st. Next race I do I will do better, its a steep learning curve.
Dave
