(Pic courtesy of www.londoncyclesport.com)
After over two years without a win (excuses including broken collarbone and becoming a dad for first time) ended up winning at Crystal Palace on Tuesday and the Surrey League handicap at South Nutfield last night.
LondonCycleSport reports: http://www.londoncyclesport.com/Results/Road_Racing/Crystal_Palace_Circuits_09_9.html
http://www.londoncyclesport.com/Results/All_Results/Surrey_League_Handicap_Series_7_1830.html
It was interesting attacking race on Tuesday. Bryan Taylor (VC Londres) went off in early laps and shortly joined by Kevin Knox (Dulwich Paragon) and teammate Guy Powdrill. Later in the race Dan Santoni (Pearsons), Adam Cotterall (InGear) and Sam Humpherson (London Dynamo) bridged and was reasonably clear this break would stay clear. Around 14 laps to go teammate Tom Hemmant attacked from bunch to start to bridge solo, and I followed a lap later and joined by Chris Ansell (Corridori) and Mike Ladbrook (Norwood Paragon). It took us a long time to bridge, because although Tom was working hard my contributions were more measured given teammates up front, making contact with just 5 laps to go when Tom immediately attacks but is brought back setting things up perfectly for me to counter. Was little off-putting to see the lap board for me go 4-4-3 'you showed me 4 twice!' but then bell and enough time to zip up jersey and for touch cheesy victory salute (no I do not know what I was trying to do with my left hand - normally I opt for plain vanilla two arms in air and in experimenting with one arm-one finger Virenque style the redundant hand ended up on stomach - oh well...). The legs weren't great and win was more due to tired legs in rest of break and lack of willingness to chase given teammates there, but fair bit of road racing is about taking the initiative when opportunity pans out rather than necessarily being stronger than competitors. I understand Santoni crashed on final lap after clipping pedal, presumably also bringing down/delaying Chris Ansell as he's not in top-10 results (little unfortunate as Chris worked hardest when we were bridging).
On Thursday the main threat was always going to be elite vet Gary Dodd (Sigma Sport), and as the scratch group worked to catch the groups ahead he was clearly the strongest. With a 3 laps to go, by which time we had caught all but the very front group, Dodd pushed hard over the motorway bridge and I reacted jumping away solo establishing a reasonable ~15 sec gap but opted not to fully commit to the effort and was caught just over a lap later. All together on the final lap and few miles to go and Micheal Staines (Corridori) jumps away and nobody reacts and gap grows as Dodd and I and others at front (including Staines teammate Chris Ansell) amble along watching each other. I roll towards front of bunch and then suddenly realise than I, inexplicably, have been allowed to drift 15-20 metres off front and need no further invitation to kick hard and set off in pursuit of the Corridori guy. I catch him around a mile before the finish and then after couple of turns we reach bottom of the short rise before finish with a small but sufficient lead, and I am able to comfortably take the sprint (South Nutfield possibly the only circuit in south/south-east with a downhill finishing straight?). Reverted to plain vanilla two arms this time. Amusingly this victory was an almost carbon copy of win on this circuit three years ago when I bridged solo to Gary Dodd and took the downhill sprint (and that was also two days after winning at that week's Crystal Palace...).
Being honest neither result is really any indication of any form (was probably going better back in April in the Easter 3-day) and more about getting tactics spot on, but always good feeling crossing line first and builds confidence.
