A Weekend of Racing

This weekend was a double race weekend, on the Saturday it was the Bristol GP, hosted by my own club BCDS, so it was a given that I was going to do that due to it being my own club. Then on the Sunday, it was trip down to the seaside town of Seaton, for the town cycle fest. The nice thing about the weekend would be that i would always have teammates in the race, especially in the Bristol GP, where the majority of the academy would be taking part.

The day of the Bristol GP was very nice weather, which definitely helped draw in crowds, making the racing have a great atmosphere. I was able to do a few laps of the course before the race began, and before my warm up, just to get to know the corners, as there were several tight turns, with quick approach speeds.

The race soon split up due to these corners and speeds, which I was able to make the front bunch, due to my recon before the race. In the front bunch were several of my teammates, so we were able to have a small bit of control on the race. I had a couple of attacks, but they never came to anything due to the strength of the riders in the front bunch, and the cornery nature of the course. I really enjoyed the race, and coming into the final laps I moved up through the group, finding a good wheel for the final sprint. Unfortunately i ended up being swamped from all side from riders moving up last ditch, something that I should have been alert and aware of, so i went backwards in the group. With the final turns it was hard to move up, but nevertheless i managed to find positions, and came across the line in 6th. An improvement from the Winchester Crit, much more aggressive riding, but I just got caught out at the last.

With that race done, it was time to cool down and head for home, and prepare for the second race of the weekend at Seaton.

The drive to seaton was horrendous. The weather was foggy, wet, and the sat nav decided to send us down lanes, which only exaggerated the bad weather. Once there it was just thick fog, and riding a few hundred meters to sign on got the bikes dripping and clothes wet.

Luckily by the start of the race the weather had cleared up, and it became quite pleasant, which was a nice surprise, as it made the course much safe and better to ride. The race set of fairly quickly, and the first time over the climb killed off a lot of the riders, as hills are rare in youth racing.

On the fourth lap the race completely split, a strong attack was made up the climb, and only me and another rider could follow it, with another group of three behind us. From racing yesterday, I was the weakest of the group, and was really feeling the effort of being away in the break, constantly extending the gap. Eventually I fell away from the break, and then I just had to get my head down and time trial to the end, but even with feeling awful I was still able to hold off the chasing pack, and came across the line for third, which was a great result, and showed that I was definitely heading in the right direction.

It was a great weekend of racing, one that I really enjoyed, and one where I got some very good results, especially on the second day, when I was most tired from the previous day’s efforts.