Stony '11.4' 30/6/10 - Drat, drat and double drat!

Another lovely evening (though rather too hot for me) for this club event.  A depleted number of "regulars" was augmented by some cyclists keen to give time trialling a shot - this was a nominated "come and try it" event.  I pounded out to the meeting point, getting there with a little time to spare. I decided to play around with gearing on the evening, and chose to tackle the main climb in a slightly lower gear that I would usually muscle up the hill.  It didn't seem to help - either I need to drop it further or I need to carry on grinding out big gears!  More problematic were the obstacles on the course this evening.  Firstly, a large tractor/trailer combo seemingly abandoned just outside Beachampton; secondly some silly kids leaping out into the course near the turn; and finally, I got stopped at the turn roundabout ("foot on the ground stopped") by a nose-to-tail line of cars coming from the right.  I don't know how much time that cost me, but I had to re-catch a rider I'd just past, and was myself caught shortly after while I was struggling back up to speed in a rather high gear. Anyway, roaring back down to Beachampton was pretty quick, and I was helped a bit by having a bit of a ding-dong with the guy who's caught me - I think I could descend a bit quicker, especially with my enormous top gear engaged. I finished with 27:51, which I wasn't hugely pleased with.  But I suppose taking into account my "excess baggage" and the hassles at the turn it wasn't too bad (any anyway this course doesn't best suit me).  I have a rare outing at an open '10' at the weekend, and it'll be good to see how that goes.

								Pos. on
Pos	No	Name	Club	Time	Cat	Vets Std	.+ / -	Vets Std
1	2	Aaron McCaffrey	AWCycles	26.10	V40	29.20	.+ 3.10	4
2	7	Tony Parks	NBRC	26.18	V45	30.29	.+ 4.11	2
3	13	David Glossy	Team Corley Cycles	26.38	S
4	8	Chris Dunwoodie	TeamMK	26.54	S
5	12	Robert Saunders	NBRC	27.51	V50	31.41	.+ 3.30	3
6	3	Martin Paul	NBRC	29.42	V40	29.20	.- 0.22	5
7	4	Clive Faine	TeamMK	30.49	V64	35.22	.+ 4.33	1
8	1	Alan Lawson	NBRC	33.26	V42	29.47	.- 3.39	6
9	9	Simon Knatchbull	TeamMK	33.40	V42	29.47	.- 3.53	7
10	11	Mike Edge	Private	36.58	V42	29.47	.- 7.11	8
11	10	Laura Powell	Private	38.59	L
	6	Adrian Cox	TeamMK	DNF Punc.
	Tandam Event
	5	Christina White	NBRC	29.09
		Brian Primmet	NBRC