Central League Cyclocross - Reading Sunday 2nd December 2012

With no Eastern Cross League action for a while it was off to Reading for some Central League racing.  A mass field of seniors/vets/women race for an hour, with no griding for the North Road riders who have mainly concentrated on the Eastern Cross league this season.  The course was set in the grounds of a school and offered limited scope for exciting racing.  The wet weather also left the going heavy and meant an unpleasant, unremitting grinding type of day, mainly spent in the saddle to retain traction.

Dave Kiely, John McDowall and Hannah Omersher had made the journey down with young Joe Kiely racing in the earlier Under 10s event.  Indeed, the day got off to a good start with the news that Joe had won his race, after a full-on last four laps battle with a bitter rival, to secure his first (of many we are sure) league cyclocross victory.

When the main race started John had a semi-decent start that had seen some progress through the field, but half way round the first lap he suddenly realised that his Garmin HRM had fallen off his bike.   A following rider had spotted it some way back so John  was forced to turn round and collect the errant computer.   This left him dead last and off the back of the field facing a lonely slog.   A heavily banged knee on a shockingly incompetent re-mount, a set of gears that simply refused to work properly all race,  combined with the almost inevitable crumbling of the McDowall back led to John reappraising  his race goals too - 1) finishing without requiring emergency open spinal surgery, and 2)  not suffering a deranged Basil Fawlty meltdown involving throwing the bike down, collecting a large branch, and screaming ‘right, I’ve warned you....I’m going to give you a damn good thrashing!‘  Since both these goals where achieved (just), John’s race in a classic case of revisionist cyclocross history, can be viewed as  a success.

Dave Kiely was also suffering....but actually before the race.   The after effects of a late night, after work, hop based carbo loading session had not done his athletic constitution much good.  His warm up consisted of one fall on the course and a comedy crash in the car park whilst attempting a hung-over bunny hop.  Dave’s start line pep talk will almost certainly not go into motivational speaking handbooks and revolved around ‘feeling sick’, ‘probably won’t make it round’ and ‘you will lap me.‘    You didn't have to be Mystic Meg to realise the omens did not look good.  However,  after a steady-as-she-goes start, Dave started to perk up and got into his racing rhythm.  Much to his credit he did the full hour, and actually managed a first in cyclocross of feeling better after the race finished than when he started it.

Hannah was also finding the going tough.  Back problems can also afflict Hannah, and this was a course almost designed to bring that out.  More used to a full on forty minutes of racing the extra twenty can really take its toll.  She battled round and added to her cyclocross knowledge, although I suspect none of the North Road riders came away a lot wiser for an hour of unremitting toil other than just how damn fast the top guys are as they speed past you.  Frankly, not a race to put on your bucket list although Reading was nice.

 

One hundred and four riders started the race with five DNF's.  Dave came home in 57th, John 83rd and Hannah in 90th.