Ever entered a 10 mile Time trial by accident?

A bit of an odd one this....

On Tuesday the 25th I went out for a ride on my bike as the weather was kind and headed over Blythfield reservoir to Abbots Bromley, by the side of the road were a group of cyclist and some signs warning of a cycle race in progress. I pulled over and asked "Whats happening guys?" and the conversation went pretty much like this.

Man: A 10 mile time trial.

Me: Oh right, Nice.

Man: Do you want to enter it?

Me: Erm? Ok!

So with that I'd signed up and had a race number pinned to me ready to go. Now I have done mountain bike races and road sportives but never a Time trial. It turns out you get sent out at 1 minuet intervals and as I was an unknown they put me up 2nd. The 1st guy went off and I moved up to the start point with the timekeeper letting you know how long to go at 15 second intervals counting down from 10 seconds and then you go. That's it time to peddle like stink for the duration of the course to achieve the best time you can (I think paceing yourself could also be a good move but I wasn't exactly prepared for this event). I am pleased with my result which gave me an average speed of 20.6mph over the 10 miles finishing in 9th place in 29:05. This was one of the most enjoyable races I have done and I would like to do more of these events as they are very fast and intense rather than 4 hours of riding around strange towns taking wrong turns when the G.P.S. stops working which seems to be the way sportives always gor for me. Funny how you fall into these things sometimes...

Martin

Sleepless in the saddle 2009 Update

Many of you will have received an email from us a while ago inviting you to support Peter Nadin who was entering the Sleepless in the saddle 24 hour cycle race in aid of a local children’s hospice. On behalf of Peter, we’d like to thank everyone for your generous support.

Peter completed the race, in 24 hours he completed 17 laps of the course, that’s an impressive 136 miles!

The course was extremely muddy as prior to the race we had rainfall for 14 consecutive days. If this didn’t make it difficult enough, during his race Peter had to stop twice – firstly to help a young lady who was having an asthma attack, and then to help a crashed rider out from under his bike in a big clump of nettles who hadn't got the energy to unclip himself from his peddals.

So after riding continually all through the day & night he finished 23rd overall out of 79 solos, and 7th of 29 veteran solos.

When he crossed the finish line Peter vowed ‘never again’ but rumour has it he’s now considering entering again in 2010 ;)

On behalf of all at CS Fire and those who have supported Peter we’d like to say a huge ‘Well Done’ and good luck for the next time.......

If you have not yet donated to Peters fund raising for the Donna Louise Trust and would like to do so http://www.justgiving.com/Peter-Nadin is the link to his just giving page.