Eastern CX League Round 10 - Grafham Water

A trip up the A1 to Grafham Water for round ten of the Eastern CX League on the warmest November day on record. 

No representation in the Vets+50 so ever-ready Vets 40-49, John McDowall and Bryan Holland, where first out of the traps.  Great start for John, less so for Bryan, meant both got themselves in decent positions for the early twisty tree dodging section.    The open, draggy, hard grinding nature of much of the course suited both our riders better than the trip into the darkened forest  last weekend.  Bryan had nipped past John but suffered a ‘dart gunned drugged rhinoceros’   fall when another rider touched wheels with him on a tricky off-camber section.  He was up, but a little winded, and John was past and in a hard working group of riders that opened a teasing gap.    The last two laps saw Bryan, and a regular rival form the Ipswich CC, put in some hard yards to get within touching distance of John who was riding on his own after his group had splintered  However, it wasn’t quite enough as John had enough in the tank to just hold off his two chasers.  

John came home in 13th (his best ever ECXL result) and Bryan an impressive 15th.  Both getting their best results for this season.  Seventy riders with four DNFs.

Three riders in the Seniors race.  Regular Matt ‘van der’ Crees was joined by Jobe Usher and Michael Atkinson.    Matt got in his own words ‘a shocking start’ losing lots of valuable  places from a good grid position.    After that he set his shoulder to the plough in typical high cadence fashion to work his way back through the field.  Michael enjoyed the course and was also involved in numerous battles with other riders.   

Jobe reported - “I had a pretty bad start, but started picking my way through after a little while settling in. Hadn't ridden the bike for over a week so handling was awful especially on the really twisty bit after the start. Jumped the ditch twice, with the second time only just managing to stay upright so ran it after that, although the remounts were tricky with it being so sloppy. Swapped places repeatedly with another guy for most of the race and almost gave it to him my messing up the final go round the off-camber section, but a mad dash to the barriers, followed by two perfectly timed leaps and a magic first time successful clip-in let me beat him to the line!‘   

Jobe was 15th, Matt 28th and Michael 32nd with 58 starters and five DNFs