On Sunday we rode in the 95km SERRL 2/3/4th category Road Race.
When I say we, I mean my team and I.
11 of us, out of a field of 60 riders. 11 of us!!!
Yes, after years of turning up to races on my own or with just Barny, the hard work that we have put in over the last 18 months paid off in every respect. Instead of Dulwich or Bigfoot or Adalta or VC Meuden bossing us around, for a change we had a chance to boss a race.
It was never going to be quite that easy however. You need legs. You need good legs.
We’d trained hard all winter and we’d been racing even harder. What we had though, over most other teams, was a friendship and commitment to each other that, before Sunday, I’d only seen on the telly!
We rode our bloody (light blue/black/white/pink) socks off 😉
Our plan was to make sure that we had one rider in every 4 riders in a breakaway. We had no idea that literally hundreds of attacks would go during such a long race. What happened to the days when you rolled out of the village hall, an early break went up the road, you forgot about it and then sprinted for 4th place at the end? No, this was like a criterium from the moment the flag went down. Actually before that; we were even fighting to get behind the lead car in the car park. I was proud of my lads as 6 of us were on the front row – they had started to listen to me and now realised that the car park one of the easiest places to move up the peloton!!
From the word go the attacks began but we were there, every time: One man in the break, half the lads on or near the front ‘policing’ the chasers and counter-attackers.
In previous races I’d come back from a break and Barny would go over the top with the counter. He’d come back and I’d still be royally knackered as the bigger teams sent a fresher man up road. We couldn’t compete with that and rarely found ourselves in that winning move. Today was different; Andy, Barny, Lee, Alex, Stu, Rich, Me, one after another we went up the road, not missing a single move. All of us, along with Ed, did a fab job marshalling the front of the race and I remember Ed saying something and me replying that I couldn’t hear him on my left side (who let a deaf bloke run a cycling team?!). In a single second Ed was on my right, discussing tactics, a fantastic example of how we were moving around the peloton was consummate ease that day. It is, after all, just a mindset.
It was a very inspiring opening lap with Andy getting in a group that gained 16 seconds on the peloton at one stage. Little did we know that that would be the biggest gap any breakaway would achieve all day. That just shows how hard the racing was that; nobody was letting anyone escape. Normally if a break succeeds there might be a lull in the action as people concede but today there were no successes in that department so the action never ever relented. It was bonkers and we loved it.
Not all of us loved it though as Rich B came down and Chris got held up in the same crash. Luckily Rich B is from South Africa so this was nowhere near as frightening as being attacked by lions (you thought I was going to say being held up at gunpoint didn’t you?!) so he got up and they formed a chase group. Even at 41 km/h they had no chance of getting back on; we were flying and their galliant effort was to no avail.
Up the front we were still putting a man in every move when 2 riders slipped away and for the first time we weren’t present. In seconds Lee, Alex, Stu and Me had hit the front and we’d brought them to a safe distance for the rival teams to make the juncture for us. Awesome.
For a moment I couldn’t see all my team mates, something that I would have considered normal up until today but now we were riding so well we were noticeable by our absence. I drifted back through the peloton; such a rarity nowadays that a rider from another team even asked if I’d punctured! I was looking for the others. Steve informed me of the crash involving Rich B and Chris. “Ok, cheers mate” I replied. Then I did a double take. “What the f@ck was Steve still doing there?!” This was (nigh on) a 60 mile road race, littered with 2nd Cats and Steve was not only still in it but able to speak?!!! Hats off to the guy. I can only assume he must have one helluva Coach 😉
Alex flew up the road on his own. Then Barny. Then me. Then Andy crept into another little break then Stu AND Lee in the same break. This was all my Christmases coming at once.
We went through the bell and the race was still ‘gruppo compacto’. 13 or so miles to go. I had a couple more digs, more to make others chase so my guys could come over the top of me. I learnt to be more aggressive than ever today (no not in the bar afterwards!). I don’t normally attack in a road race because, although this course is described as ‘the flattest one’, they’re never flat (come to Belgium!) and when Andy says he was on the limit at 360 watts I can only dream of having to put out so little in a breakway on a course like this lol. Andy proved to be the man of the match however, bagging 9th place at the end to lead the team home. I had ridden harder than I’d ever ridden (I always say that?!) and there was this really cool vibe amongst us that the end result didn’t matter today. We were all smiling (just check out that pic) as we’d nailed that race and we’d nailed it AS A TEAM. We went with 99% of the (many many) attacks, 8 riders finished and we had a bloody ball.
Ed summed up the day better than I could (I’ll have a bloody good go next though!):
“It was great to do a race where results felt of secondary importance to teamwork.
If one of our many breaks had been allowed away then we would have bagged a top result but the pack was in a fast mood and we all got a great race because of it.”
We rode near the front, we communicated superbly and today we became a friggin’ racing team.
I am very proud.
PB
PB Cycle Coaching Copyright © 2018.