Antelope 3-up 50km TTT - Saturday April 13th 2013
Sun 21 Apr 2013
Colin Bailey, Shaun Rose and Paul McGrath in top 20 finish in Antelope 3-up TTT
Colin Bailey, Shaun Rose and I entered the 50km Antelope 3-up TTT, which was held down in Chalgrove, Oxon. We as Road racers entered the world of TTT to get some valuable practice in as riding as team. We have put in an application for a North Road team to enter the Ras de Cymru (Tour of Wales) in June and part of it incorporates a TTT. Finding time to ride together is difficult due to work/family and thought if we get accepted for Ras de Cymru we best of had at least a couple of runs out together.
We had only ridden once together before; this was at the Crest RR. So the 3-up TTT was going to be a learning experience more anything else.
The 3-Up TTT also had the BUCS Championships running within it. This meant it attracted a large quality field of 240 riders in 80 teams. Looking down the start sheet there was top quality pro teams such as IG-Sigma Sport with riders Wouter Synbrandy, Joe Perret and Andrew Griffiths as well as Magnus Backstedt, Liam Stones and Jamie Scott and the MG-Maxifuel team. Pro riders such as Wojciech Szlachta (twenty3c-Focus) were in the ranks of the University teams and a product of British Cycling Hannah Barnes representing the strength of the women riding.
After acknowledging it was a bit of who’s who, the nerves kicked in when we saw we were sandwiched in at the business end of proceedings. With all the big teams in and around us it was clear we wouldn’t be catching any one in front of us and have to be on the lookout for the teams behind us.
Teams started rolling out just after 1pm, our start time was not until 17:21 so quite late in the day. On arrival to sign in we could see we would be one of only a few teams riding road bikes and not rocking the full TTsetup, so already giving away a bit of time. What made matters worse was the fact at around 16:30 the weather took a turn for the worse with gusting winds and torrential rain. It continued to rain for the remainder of the day.
After getting changed and placing the swim cap over the helmet (my improvised aero helmet!!), the 3 of us hit the country lanes for a warm up. Not really a warm up as such, more like a mobile shower with a forceful intermittent freezing cold blow dry. On more than one occasion the words ‘who’s bloody idea was this’ where heard being muttered, not only from all members of North Road but from passing competitors and the start/push off marshals.
Our start time approached and we lined up ready to go, we watched MG Maxifuel and Arctic-Sram shoot off into the distance. We had a 3 teams going off behind us, High Wycombe (last year’s winners) directly after us and IG-Sigma Sport going off last. Our plan was to try and survive the 50 km without Sigma-Sport catching us. This meant we had a 9 minute head start. With the worsening weather conditions and the relative flat, non-technical course this was possible a big ask.
Colin, instigator of all this malarkey led the team off first. We had planned to ride a couple of minutes on the front at threshold and swap, and then take it from there. Colin and I have ridden a few times together so we are little bit more aware of each other’s capabilities. After a couple of miles we seemed to be rolling through OK and moving at a respectable average pace. The course had long undulating sections through open fields which in these conditions meant fierce cross winds. With me at 6’5 and weighing in at 87kg the wind did not have the same effect it had on my 5’ something 65kg teammates. Shaun’s main sport is hockey and does very little if any structured cycle training. He just rides his bike as hard and as fast as he can for as long as he can. We had only met Shaun once before today and in the space of matter of minutes he agreed to ride the Tour of Wales. That I think says it all, he likes a challenge, the bigger the better. Quite early on around 6 miles/10km of the 50km, we nearly dropped Shaun. His eagerness had got the better of him and he had just gone to deep into the red on his pulls on the front in the strong winds. To register a time, teams would have to finish with 3 men. So leaving him was not an option. Colin and I took over the duties on the front, with me taking longer turns in the more wind affected sections. Shaun being the battler he is, sat on and dug in and held on in there. This in these conditions meant sitting back wheel getting a face full of spray. After a while I think Shaun must of got fed up of getting constantly soaked by the pair of us, as after we rolled through the first part of our second lap Shaun came back to the front to take over duties.
We had managed to hold of High Wycombe for a lap with them passing us just as we crossed the halfway point. We would end up finishing 4 minutes down on them, meaning we only lost a minute to them on the 2ndlap compared to 3 on the first.
As the miles/km clicked down we kept nervously looking behind us to see if we could catch glimpse of Sigma Sport. Could we hold them off? 15km to go, I finished my turn on the front and took my place at the back of the little echelon we had formed to combat the wind across the field, a little look back and there was nothing. 10km to go, still nothing. 5km to go we turned on the drag home, still we saw nothing. For the finish we had to turn a 90' left off the main road with a straight dash to the line further 900 meters down . As we approached the turn we could see, from what appeared from nowhere the black and red steam train that was Sigma Sport, it was approaching fast. We turned the corner put our heads down and gave it the last push up the final 900m to the finish. With the finish line in sight we had nearly done it. As we were just about to cross the line Wouter Sybrandy and his Sigma Sport Team swung out to cross the line just in front of us. Damn almost but not quite.
We finished 9 mins 1 sec down on Sigma who would take the win. We placed 20th out of 80. Overall we were very pleased on the performance given the fact this was our first real outing together, the poor weather conditions, the level of competition and the lack of TT bikes etc, the result was a bonus. A touch over 2 mins quicker and we would of made top ten.
Top 30 results
Team No Riders Team Lap 1 Final
1 80 Wouter Sybrandy Joe Perrett Andrew Griffiths Team IG - Sigma Sport 00:33:53 01:05:34
2 74 Jamie Scott Liam Stones Magnus Backstedt MG Maxifuel Pro Cycling 00:34:45 01:06:49
3 76 Tim Bayley Michael Broadwith Danny Axford Arctic-SRAM Racing Team 00:34:50 01:07:43
4 68 Mark Baines Ed Clemens Chris Dredge Spirit RT 00:35:29 01:08:50
5 15 Wojciech Szlachta Edmund Bradbury Charles Pitt-ford Cambridge University CC 00:35:38 01:09:49
6 35 Richard Oram Alexander Murison Peter Medhurst University of Exeter 00:36:02 01:10:16
7 78 Henry King Jonathan Shubert Lee Tunnicliffe High Wycombe CC 00:35:08 01:10:17
8 72 Matt Harris Charles Mitchell Sebastian Ader a3crg 00:37:45 01:11:36
9 10 Ben Reid Aistis Simiaitis Douglas Bruce Oxford University CC 00:36:46 01:11:41
10 58 Joel Lewis Justin Garon Kevin Hardwick Arbis Colbert RT 00:37:10 01:12:18
11 20 Nick Baker Dan Bigham Jack Lawlor-Anderson Oxford Brookes University 00:37:14 01:12:26
12 50 James Jobber Andrew Nichols Nick Latimer University of Sheffield 00:37:22 01:12:27
13 55 Karl Moseley Stefan Harrison Mark Hammond Stourbridge Velo 00:37:19 01:12:35
14 5 Alex Bostrom Jaroslav Zak James Graveston Oxford University CC 00:37:16 01:12:39
15 73 Mark Cox Michael Murphy Paul Lloyd Fairly United Cycling Team 00:37:20 01:12:39
16 19 Alastair Canaway Jack Peasgood Chris Wilkinson University of Birmingham 00:36:59 01:12:46
17 65 Rob Fletcher Mike Wragg Richard Wood Arbis Colbert RT 00:37:18 01:12:56
18 11 Liam Glen Pierre Thomas Doug Hall University of Bath 00:37:58 01:13:52
19 40 Ben Wimpory Jonathan Coulson Christopher Bates Loughborough University 00:38:17 01:14:07
20 77 Colin Bailey Paul McGrath Shaun Rouse North Road CC 00:38:51 01:14:35
21 66 Karla Boddy Hannah Barnes Charline Joiner MG-Maxifuel Pro Cycling 00:38:58 01:15:16
22 26 Creighton Varney Karl Alexander Dave Johnson HWCC/VC10 00:38:37 01:15:34
23 45 William Haynes Andrew Miles Matthew Atkinson Durham University 00:39:31 01:17:02
24 49 Rory Gilling Sam Nunn Nick Domise Loughborough University 00:39:38 01:17:17
25 67 Nathan Blake Sean Nicolle Christopher Pillar Oxford Tri Club 00:39:37 01:17:25
26 38 Andrew Myers Michael Caley Samuel Bennett University of Sheffield 00:39:53 01:17:27
27 79 Peter Oliver Chris Edginton Neil Johnson Fairly United Cycling Team 00:40:35 01:17:33
28 29 Alex Stephenson-Brown Joseph Withers Jonathan Dredge University of Birmingham 00:40:07 01:18:01
29 75 Alex Peeke David Scott Adrian Trott Welwyn Wheelers 00:40:08 01:18:19
30 64 Phil Watts Robert Watson Jonathan Hobby North Hampshire RC 00:40:40 01:18:37