Big Al Posted April 21, 2014 Report Share Posted April 21, 2014 Finally recovered enough to write a bit! Another fantastic day of weather in East Lothian for a great event on some hilly country roads. Mike Ferguson and I were along for another TT outing on a hilly course, and it was a cracker! Two laps of an 11.5m course made it interesting as there were more people than usual to chase down! The course begins with a slightly uphill start, then plunges into East Saltoun with a couple of (well marshalled) junctions to negotiate and then downhill for a couple of miles, easily mid 30's and I passed my first victim at 43mph after 4 minutes. There was steady uphill and some 33mph flats with the tailwind for the next few miles, then came a challenging downhill with a couple of sharp "red flagged" corners. Not for the faint hearted! It got interesting at the 18minute point as Stuart Balfour, a wee slip of a boy who regularly wins the 'A' races at track league, caught me just at the end of the biggest hill. He was on his second lap and flying, he went off number 5 and I went off 33. I knew he was going to well up the standings at the end, and I did the maths on how much he had taken out me and where we were at, and realised I was doing quite well. We started on a long undulating section heading back towards the finish line and I managed to power up, push myself well into the red and pass him again at speed. He caught me again on the last hill before lap 2 but I overtook him at 40 on the start/finish straight for the start of lap 2 for me. I hit lap 2 spurred on and knew I was going to be well inside my target of 60 minutes as I started lap 2 on 29 minutes. Knowing exactly what was coming I managed to keep pushing and caught another 5 or 6 riders on the way round. Great fun! So, I finished up getting the prize for 3rd (I was actually 4th in the end) as Gary Robson 14secs in front of me got the 1st Vet prize. Stuart Balfour ended up just about 1 minute in front of me and he won overall, impressive for a junior! I was quite pleased with the day out, as I left with my petrol paid for in prize money and 3 minutes faster over the hour relative to everyone there that I'd competed against already this year. That said, I did have to actually lie down a couple of times mid conversation on the pavement while chatting to Jon from Glasgow Wheelers afterwards. Bring on the flat stuff! Colin McPhee, Richard, Ramsay and 2 others 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2023 Subscriptions thejanullrichdietplan Posted April 22, 2014 2023 Subscriptions Report Share Posted April 22, 2014 Well done Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2023 Subscriptions P McDonald Posted April 22, 2014 2023 Subscriptions Report Share Posted April 22, 2014 well done Al Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2023 Subscriptions Ramsay Posted April 22, 2014 2023 Subscriptions Report Share Posted April 22, 2014 Chapeau! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2023 Subscriptions charlie p Posted April 22, 2014 2023 Subscriptions Report Share Posted April 22, 2014 Well done big man Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2023 Subscriptions ginty001 Posted April 22, 2014 2023 Subscriptions Report Share Posted April 22, 2014 Well done big Al, keep up the good write ups too :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2023 Subscriptions KarenG Posted April 22, 2014 2023 Subscriptions Report Share Posted April 22, 2014 Well done Al! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Al Posted April 22, 2014 Author Report Share Posted April 22, 2014 Putting it into perspective, I'm still gubbed today! Only got the three races this week too Looked at the Gordon Arms 20.5m TT results, Stuart beat me by 4.5mins brought down to 1min, Gary by 3mins down to 14secs, Jon Clarke beat me by 22secs, beat him by 3.5mins. Moral of the story? Go faster in the Gordon Arms next year!! Jodyc 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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