Thetford WS3 - Richards Race Report; As with every Thetford Winter series it is almost certain that there will be one race where you know it is going to be a tough outing before even turning a pedal. I realised WS3 was going to be just that when watching the weather forecast on Saturday night! I find that when I know it is going to be wet and miserable before the race then I prepare for it and then am ready for a hard ride and secretly quite enjoy it when it all gets a bit horrible! As usual the first lap pace was nothing short of blooming quick! I felt that I was pushing far too hard for the first lap of a 4hr race. Especially as I had been suffering with a cold all week and was riding my old winter bike instead of my usual race bike. I went through the start arena at the beginning of the 2nd lap and was entertaining the thought of pulling over and calling it a day as I was really suffering with my breathing. In my usual stubborn way I made myself push on for another lap to see how it went and fortunately I started to feel a bit better as the pace slowed slightly. I soon realised that after spending the first lap moaning to myself about feeling ill I had let one of my rivals go off up the road. I knew that to secure a overall series podium place I had to beet Tom Ward from team Giant Newdales, I could see him and another rider several hundred meters ahead so I decided to push on and try to catch them. To do this I had to push harder than I felt comfortable with, but soon bridged the gap. When I caught Tom I went straight passed him and tried to up the pace with the hope of distancing him. However this was not going to be an easy task as Tom is a very strong rider. For almost 2 hours we rode keeping each other in sight, sometimes I would get a small lead and then sometimes he would but we were never far apart. It was great fun racing like this. There was no messing about trying to out fox each other, we were just riding our own races and making ourselves suffer as we ploughed through the thickening mud. As we went into the last lap I had a lead of about 30 seconds from Tom but I was running into trouble and before I knew it I had a hit the wall spectacularly! With no more energy in the tank I was suffering and with it my pace dropped dramatically. Unfortunately I didnt have any more energy gels to revive myself so it was just a case of hanging on to the end. Half way through the last lap I was caught and passed by another rider but I didnt have enough energy to give much of a chase and had to except the loss of a position so I was now running in 4th. I pushed as hard as I could to the finish line and was happy to finish a very hard race and although not the best result I have had I’d done enough to secure a series podium place. Thanks very much to everyone who supported us all out in the awful weather this weekend and to all of our sponsors; City College Norwich, Torq fitness, Chain Reaction, Streetlife and Nuflex Muscle & Joint Care!
Posted on: Tue, 28 Jan 2014 07:58:03 +0000