Savage Weekend

I’ve been neglecting my blog over the last two weeks due to fun fun fun A Level revision and exams, however, as of yesterday I am free from exams for at least 3 months. Lucky me.

This weekend myself and my team had yet another busy weekend of riding on the cards. It started with a Hillingdon Winter Series on Saturday, winter being the focal word of this sentence with it feeling like it was at least -20 degrees on the day. It was the first race of the year in which the whole team attended so despite the cold weather everyone was fired up to start the season with a bang. The only riders who couldn’t make it were Jack OB and George Pearle, who are both experiencing ongoing illness, and Will Kemp, who had teaching commitments to attend to.

LEWNOZ set the standard high coming 2^nd in the 4 cat race with Tom Redwood also putting in a solid performance, although he unfortunately ended up getting boxed in the gallop.  Everybody else was riding in the E,1,2,3s and in the first half of the race there were quite a few moves with our riders in it that were dilly dallying on and off the front of the bunch. At about the half way point the significant move of the day went, with 8 riders in it, and we had ‘northern star’ Matt Pilkington comfortably in the mix. The rest of the team blocked and chased down attacks when necessary but after only about 15 minutes it became apparent that the break was not going to see the bunch again for the rest of the race. Matt ended up getting a well deserved second place missing out on a win by less than wheels length to Orbea rider Lewis Atkins.

It was a far more successful first race of the year than last year’s as I am told, as I was not in the team then, that most of the team ended up on the floor at this event last time around.

Sunday meant an early start to meet at the Triangle in Burgess Hill for 8:15am for the routine team training session. However, this week it was not so routine as we were being photographed before and during the ride by a professional photographer and were told that the pictures would appear in Cycling Weekly as well some other magazines. So look out for a ‘wall of orange’, as some other riders have started calling us, in cycle magazines over the next few weeks to. The ride was not the usual route either, as we embarked on a trip to Beachy Head and back to take in a more ‘scenic’ route for the photographer. Once we reached Beachy Head we met youth team mate Sara who then joined us for the trip back. By the end we did 76 miles which took little over 4 hours.

After getting out of our kit and in to people clothes we then headed for some lunch and then for a Seminar from team manager, Dan Bennett. After talking about the ride today and yesterday’s race we were shown the 99% finished team calender for the year and from what I saw nearly everyone seemed as excited as me about it. By the looks of it were in for a tough year but with a stronger team than last year, due to progression from riders as well as a few new signings, we are hopeful for some very good results indeed.

My training has been going pretty well since my ‘man flu’ at the beginning of January and I am on my 3^rd week of training from coach, Stuart Blunt, since then. In just over a week’s time is my first road race of the season which is the Perfs Pedal Race. It’s looking like we’re going to have five riders  from the team for the race so hopefully we can get a good result to continue the team’s decent early season form.

First weekend back on the bike

This weekend I was back on my bike after being ill and after initially expecting to be going like a sack of potatoes it actually turned out that I hadn't lost all that much form. Obviously will take a week or two to get back to where I was but still I was feeling nowhere near as bad as I was expecting!

On Saturday the team had a Newport session planned for the evening which meant I could have a lie in Saturday morning before the mind numbing travel up to welshland. Fortunately it proved not to be too bad as I had the very entertaining company of Will Kemp and Drew and Trevor Holmes in the team van. The session went pretty well and it was clear that Will was the strongest even though he probably lost about 80% of the power he put through the pedals by being rather, to put it politely, 'unsmooth'. It was good to see all the guys who were only riding the track for the second time, and Tom Redwood who was riding it for the first time, getting stuck in and apart from the odd hairy moment it all went really well. On the way home Trevor took us to for a cheeky sweet chilli chicken deli in a certain dubious restaurant with golden arches, but it turned out to be the perfect recovery food, probably because it was either that or go hungry though.

Despite the bad looking weather prediction from Will Kemp's mate who apparently is always 'hot on the weather' it turned out to be a pretty nice day for a ride today. It was one of the first days in over a month that it was actually good cycling conditions, and you could tell as there were loads of riders out on the roads today. I set off aiming to meet team mates Tom Laker , Drew Holmes, Will Kemp and also Sigma rider Tom Copeland in Ditchling for 10:30. However, my ride started pretty badly as after only 10 minutes riding the rear derailleur snapped off on my winter bike. Luckily my dad wasn't doing anything this morning as was able to drive me over my race bike which brought me a lot of stick from the other riders for 'riding carbon on the roads in January' but to be honest I didn't have much choice. Once we had met in Ditchling Tom C lead us along to Ditchling Beacon which we preceded to climb. Will Kemp decided that he wasn't even going to try to follow Tom C's hot pace, from what I've heard Will has been riding with Tom a lot lately so clearly knew all about the pain that was in store for us who tried to follow. Drew lost the wheels about half way up and I was dispatched about three quarters of the way up which I was pretty happy about to be honest after being ill. Tom L did a solid job and stayed with Tom C all the way to the top of the climb and he seemed to do it fairly comfortably, it must be something about the name.
After this Tom C tested our physical and technical skills all the way to Lewes where we met the McNamara Brothers, Paul Barnard and a few others for a few more hours of pain. After this Tom L, Drew and myself decided it was time for a coffee stop and the others kept going as the likes of Will and Tom C were planning on doing 5/6 hours, whereas us youg'uns only had four ours set by our separate coaches. After our Coffee we started heading back and after about 15 minutes I departed from Tom and Drew to face the very slow crawl home back to Brighton against the huge headwind. By the time I got home I was WRECKED but was pretty happy with my first weekend back on the bike and I'm looking forward to getting back on a training plan for some more pain.

Here are some photos of our ride courtesy of The Cycling Teacher (Will Kemp) who most inappropriately decided it would by a good idea to start taking pictures on his phone on the section of road with the strongest cross winds. Nice one Will.

Photos of the Newport Session will be up soon.

Road bike 2011

As promised yesterday here are pictures of my road bike, complete with new wheels, for this season.



Frame: Specialized Tarmac SL

Groupset: Shimano Ultegra 6700

Race Wheels: Reynolds Assault 2010
Tyres: Continental Sprinter Tubular Tyres
Seatpost: Some Carbon Ting From The Depths Of The Garage
Saddle: Fizik Arione

Handle Bars: 3T Rotundo Pro

Bar Tape: Black Fizik Microtex Soft Touch With Logo

Stem: ITM Millenium

Headset: Cane Creek

Cranks: FSA Carbon Pro Team Issue

Computer: Blackburn Delphi 4.0

Pedal: SPD SL (the shit model)

Omg Omg Omg Omg I have NEW WHEEEEELS (and a huge debt)

Initially I was going to name this post 'Christmas Again' like team mate Charlie Fawke did when his new wheels turned up yesterday, but then I thought actually I am going to be moneyless and in debt to 'mummy and daddy' for the next few months because of these damn, but still wonderful, beautiful and magnificent, wheels. Anyway, these are the wheels:

I will put pictures of my completed road bike for this season up tomorrow.

Back on the bike

(In the words of http://charliefawkeridersblog.blogspot.com/) 'Sooooooooo', pretty much got over the illness now, but I'm going to leave it a few days before I ride again just make sure I am properly over it. I'm riding at Newport with the team on Saturday for a two hour session which will be pretty good and hopefully my new Deda Newton Shallow bars and orange Lizard Skins bar tape will arrive in time for me to use. It will be good to get back on the boards after the disappointment of having to miss the Madison at Newport last weekend. I am also looking forward to see team track star Will Kemp's new track machine, as if he wasn't enough of a machine before, and as long as Drew Holmes makes it further than the first banking this time then it will be good a trip!

On Sunday I'm going for a training ride with team mates Tom Laker (lakerman) and Drew. It will be good to get out on the roads again; my last decent long road ride was over two weeks ago now! I think I'm going to be out on the roads of Sussex a lot over the rest of January and then on into February in the run up to the season proper, hopefully the weather won't be too cruel to me.

This training will hopefully prepare me for the first round of the Junior National Series for 2011 which is the Cadence Road Race in Abergevenny. I had an absolute mare in the race last year as I got dropped on the first real big climb about half way through the race, but this year I have had a much stronger winter and I've got a whole year of road racing before me now so I expect to get a much better performance. Earlier today Team Manager Dan Bennett let us know that he has booked accommodation for most of the rounds of the National Series which is good to know. He also gave us a list containing information on every round of the series for this year. I immediately noticed that out of the seven rounds this year two are crits, one more than last year. The new crit which has been added has taken the place of a road race. This annoyed me as being a Junior, and therefore allowed to race on the road for the first time, I was hoping that we would have more road races this year not less. I am also frustrated that the race is way up north in Newcastle, we may have to bring u23 rider Matt Pilkington with us as I don't think any of the juniors on the team can speak the language up north. Seriously though, there are no rounds of the series in the Southern half of the country, except for Bristol but that basically counts as Wales and it's still a pretty decent drive for most people. Last year one out of the seven rounds, the Somerset Road Race, was in the south but that race has been discontinued for this year meaning that this season there are no rounds in the southern half of the country meaning for anybody living in the south-east the closest rounds are at least 3 hours in the car. However, as long as I can get to every round with enough time to prepare well I won't be complaining too much, just thinking about each round is making me increasingly excited for the 2011 season to get underway.

Tough course for first round of the Junior Nat Series, The Cadence Road Race.

Ongoing Illness

Just got back from leaving the house for the first time in a week to go to the doctors about my flu type condition. The doctor said my illness is nothing serious but I need lots of rest and lots of fluids which is pretty annoying as it has now been 8 days since I've ridden my bike and I'm getting seriously bored of Pro Cycling Manager (PCM), I know it's hard to believe! I actually attempted to fill some of my time today with some college work but soon came to my senses and turned back on PCM, now in my 5th season with my Katusha.

At least, on the bright side, I have lost quite a lot of weight during this spell of illness and have lost some of puppy fat. Although I must emphasise the word 'some'. I'm no Will Kemp but I'm certainly not as skinny as Michael 'the chicken' Rasmussen yet!

New wheels for this season

For this season me and team mate Charlie Fawke (chizzle fizzle) will be riding Reynolds Assault wheels which we've both purchased on ebay all the way from the US and A. I did a lot of research before buying them and from what I've read in reviews and forums it seems were getting a lot of wheel for the amount of money were paying. So providing they don't get stuck in customs we should be able to ride them for our first road race of the season which is the Perfs Pedal Race on 13th February.



I've now had to drop out of the team training session in Burgess Hill tomorrow, because of my illness, as well as having to cancel the trip to sheepland for the Welsh Open Madison Champs which I would be riding in at the time of writing if it weren't for being ill! It's quite depressing not being able to ride, but I've been filling my time wisely today watching the FA Cup 3rd round on the tele whilst cleaning my road bike with baby whipes, inside the house of course, as I've been advised by coach Mr. Stuart Blunt to avoid going outside when at all possible. I haven't left the house for over 3 days now so I would say I'm following his advice pretty well!