Saturday 16 July 2011

Gas Hill Gasp and MSG Summer Enduro



Last Friday finished work got changed and rode just around the corner of my office to the Gas Hill Gasp and local hill climb event which cycleaid were co-sponsoring.
I hadnt entered as the next morning I had the 10hr enduro but on arriving and having a couple of rides up the lung-busting 1/5 climb i was gutted I had not entered.
The event was done in heats of 4 riders at a time with 2 going through to the next round until the last four remained.
The fastest riders were getting up in just under 30 secs and the crowds were amassing with the sign on being situated in a city centre pub on a Friday night (possibly a cycling first) the crowds were fuelled by the easy access to beer and fine ales.
I stayed until 9pm but couldn’t watch the finish as I had to get off to Thetford camp out for the race next morning.
After arriving at Brandon Country park @ thetford at nearly ten and already having my tent and trade tent set up thanks to friends Johnny and Ian, proceeding to eat the usual 8 person portion of pasta downed with a couple of beers and tried to get some sleep in the pop up tent. after a usually awful nights sleep we were up and setting the food and drinks out in the trade tent for easy access on laps and got a little warm up before the 10am off.
Not having ridden the course didnt know what to expect but assuming that it was over a shorter than usual 10hrs and on fairly flat and fast thetford course knew it would be relentless.
With the first lap of a 8.2 mile circuit taken 33mins knew it was going to be a hard day, at that pace I got to about 8hrs and started to suffer big time.
Rolling in after 9hrs and 49mins after 15 laps and having another 11mins to go out an do another I decided against it and hoped that my gap over the 7th place rider would hold and with luck Mark was behind by a fair amount of time and also on 15 laps. 5th place went out for 16 laps but with 10mins on me it was unlikely I could have caught him on such a short/fast course.
So 6th place was a fair effort however I was a bit disappointed as felt had I prepared better and got more sleep I could have done better.

Results can be found at http://www.timelaps.co.uk/assets/uploads/EVENTREPORT.aspx?eventid=174FireRoad609/07/2011

Big well done to my training partner Ian Read who this was his first enduro event of the year and by far his best race result to date rolled in 11th with 14laps. His dedication to training as really paid off and should be really happy.

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