Creeping

Phil Jones caught this image of me creeping last week at the London League at Reed Court Farm.

Sometimes you do stuff...

...and you hate it. Sometimes you do stuff that you're not too unhappy with. Most of the time, the quicker it is, the happier I am with it.

Hen's teeth.

From boy to man...

I am making the jump from racing on 'just' tubs, to racing on Dugast tubs! Okay, they remain box-fresh but boy do they look mean!!!

Rumoured to roll faster than the generic Challenge/Gommitalia tread that I've been campaigning for the last few years, they look like a buzz-saw blade manifest as a tyre! Hoping this is going to furnish me with a bit more grip than before.

Fortunately I'm taking a weekend off from racing so I can take my sweet time over getting them glued in time for the Inter-Areas next weekend -and no, I won't be debuting them the night before at the Halloween cross...

Matte, it's the new Black

Matte Black cars. Noticed a lot of them around lately. Mostly it's been on big, gangsta SUV's but I saw a BMW M3 the other day and this stealth R8 yesterday.

Remeniscent of prototype cars when they are undergoing their secretive testing.

Hillclimbs, meh!

Saturday morning, it's early and I'm woefully underdressed as I set off to ride down to Leith Hill where my cousin Will is organising the London Dynamo Hillclimb. Despite my build and relative fast-twitch make up, I've never gone up hills well but I thought I'd show some support for the event. Within a mile I had to stop and pull more clothes out of my bag and even contemplated going back home to change completely!

I felt dead in the legs long before I arrived at the sign-on which I did with 9 minutes to spare (it was at least a 5 minute ride back to the start).

Rolling away from the start, I was well aware of keeping my effort below my anaerobic threshold as I didn't want to feel like I was breathing razor blades for the rest of the week, let alone in the cross race the next day. Needless to say, I was slow. Dead slow. The Ridley Noah with original Mavic Cosmic Carbones (1800g) is probably not the ideal hillclimb weapon. Two out of the three girls beat me and guys who I regularly lap in the cross gave me a sound thrashing.

I got cold. Real cold and then rode home. 5hrs all in. Already dead legs were now thoroughly deadened in advance of Sunday's cross...

National Trophy Cyclocross, Rd.2 Derby.

Loads of Belgians turned up to the 2nd round of the National Trophy on Sunday, even rumored to have been on start-money! I was gridded near the back as usual but got away to a great start, exiting the pit area in about 30th place.

It had been steadily drizzling all morning and despite the sun coming out for the Elite race, the course remained treacherously slippery (I have decided to invest in some Dugast Rhino's). The exit from the pits transitioned from grass to tarmac whilst turned sharp left up a climb. As I went to put the power down, my rear wheel spun out and overtook the front, unceremoniously dumping the bike on the ground. I lost 8 places right there.

I chased back on and caught the group that now contained my sparring partner Andy. As I committed to remounting my bike following the hurdle, Andy came up my outside and I booted his bike full-force which sent me staggering backwards off mine. Again, I lost the group and again I chased back on.

By now it was clear (to me) that I was covering ground quicker than this group and I worked my way to the front to share the load. Along a muddy off-camber section my bike seemingly disappeared from under me and Andy came past me. On the following climb the door shut on me and I got pushed into one of the marker poles, forcing me to stall.

For a third time I lost the group and was forced to chase back on, only this time I never quite mustered the legs to get back on. I rode for lap after lap on my own but the elastic finally snapped and the leader caught me on the bell lap. A frustrating day but that's racing and there is much to be learnt from riding these events.

The London Cycle Show is out of the way now, allowing me to focus more clearly on training. This coming weekend sees an entry into the London Dynamo Hillclimb(!) and then the next London League is at Marden on Sunday.