Stony Stratford '11.4' 28th April 2010: Pipped!

This evening's event was scheduled to be run on the 11.4 mile Stony Stratford course.  In the end we used a backup course due to roadworks and traffic lights in Nash: a 9.4 mile circuit running from Stony Stratford through Beachampton to Nash, where we took the left turn to Whaddon and back to Stony Stratford via Calverton (see map below).  I rode a small section of this course en route to sign on, and it didn't enthuse me particularly: the road surface was gravelly, rough, potholed, and the road twisted around a lot.  One or two of the riders had ridden this course earlier in the week in the TeamMK event on Monday, and had some experience.  This was good for them, but the did keep telling alarming tales of the course - horror stories of gradients and potholes!  In the event, it wasn't too bad, but rather tough!  It was a nice warm evening, but rather breezy.  Unlike our usual Stony 11.4 mile course, there isn't a flat section to get the rider started: instead it's straight into the lumpy section of the course.  And this bit had something of a headwind!  It was rather depressing to see how the various potholes and defective road surface have still not been dealt with - the ravages of the winter haven't helped!  The course was familiar until the Nash crossroad, where it turned left to Whaddon.  In fact as far as Whaddon, the road surface wasn't too bad, it was just that the road was kind of lumpy, which a brief climb up to Whaddon for the left turn.  From Whaddon there's a long fast straight section.  Fast, that is, as long as you stayed well into the road and away from the dodgy surface! Then another short, sharp climb and we were on the really rough bit, with gravel and tight turns as we raced towards Calverton.  The finish came as something as a surprise -I'd thought it was a bit further down the road.  Nevertheless, I was quite pleased with my 24:32 - if we need to use the course on our next visit to Stony Sratford, I'd hope to go that little quicker through familiarity with the course.  Congatulations to Lindz for taking the honours (and keeping the "grudge match" going!  I'm already looking forward to next week's event on the Stoke Hammond course (which is an inter-club event with the A5 Rangers and League Round 3). Map
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								Pos. on
Pos	No	Name	Club	Time	Cat	Vets Std	.+ / -	Vets Std
1	6	Lindz Barral	i-team.CC	24.25	S
2	7	Robert Saunders	NBRC	24.32	V50	26.10	.+ 1.38	1
3	15	Daniel Crawley	Crest Ilford CC	24.34	S
4	10	Chris Dunwoodie	TeamMK	24.41	S
5	16	Phil Jenkins	TeamMK	25.08	V41	24.25	.- 0.43	4
6	14	John Buchanan	TeamMK	25.29	V40	24.14	.- 1.15	6
7	3	Leigh Smith	Alpha Road club	25.41	S
8	4	Brian Primett	NBRC	25.49	V43	24.48	.-1.01	5
9	11	Matt Wootton	TeamMK	26.10	S
10	13	Rob Chaundy	TeamMK	26.30	V58	27.52	.+ 1.22	2
11	1	Alan Lawson	NBRC	29.58	V41	24.25	.- 5.33	7
12	2	Gordon Batcock	NBRC	30.13	V69	30.24	.+ 0.11	3
13	5	Tony Brunton	NBRC	30.47	V45	25.11	.- 5.36	8
14	12	Russell Phillips	TeamMK	32.38	S
	8	David Skeggs	NBRC	DNF	V41
	9	Chris Selley	NBRC	DNF	V41