John McDowall second at Dunton!!

LVRC Dunton - Sunday 24th of August 2008 

LVRC racing round the Ford test track at Dunton attracted a smaller field than usual, with a bleak Bank Holiday August weather forecast.  With conditions looking decidedly grim Richard Somerset, Del Evans and Nick Harris were Absent Without Leave, leaving the North Road represented by John McDowall, Chris Glithero, Simon Best, and for his first outing of the year Rod Kelson. 
In a grim reminder of the club twenty-five a few weeks ago, conditions looked fine until rider’s pinned on their numbers and started to warm up.  This was the signal for persistent, heavy drizzle, driven on by a blustery cold wind that would continue for two-thirds of the race.  It would take the most myopic of rider’s to call Dunton picturesque, but with riding conditions more akin to a bleak October day, and slippery road conditions on a banked track it was hard to get motivated and involved as the race started out. 
However, the race evolved into a more interesting event than is usual round Dunton.  Some early breaks where reeled in, as the combination of a hard, banked climb followed by a long straight into the teeth of the gale made getting out from the gluttonous reach of the bunch a hard fought affair 
Eventually, a strong group of three riders, two from the same sponsored club, got away and opened up a thirty second gap. Some hard racing then ensued, particularly when Rod got to the front of the chasing group as the pace upped noticeably, requiring much digging of nails into handlebar tape. 
It was during one of these efforts that Chris was dropped from a thinning bunch. Despite vocal efforts from Rod to organize a chase of the leading trio, not much interest was shown by the bunch. 
John made a solo effort to bridge the gap but couldn’t continue with the effort and dropped back after a lap away into the main peloton.  
Towards the end of the race we turned into one of the straights and were a little surprised to come across the two sponsored riders hobbling up the track, out of the race, after some sort of coming together leaving just the one man away. 
With a bunch sprint looking inevitable with two laps to go, John eschewing any big gear show boating,  rolled off the front in a sneak ‘I’m-not-really-attacking-but-I-actually-am’ type of break away (© Jim Ewers circa 1972).  With Simon and Rod spoiling in the main bunch, John managed to keep just away to claim a well deserved second place. 
Rod won the bunch sprint to claim third place, along with a prime earlier, after a big lead out from Simon enabled him to use his sprinting prowess. Although Rod professed a little disappointment that he couldn’t use his usual eleven sprocket in the sprint due to Simon not being fast enough! 
A good result for the club with a second and third, as well as some active racing from all involved.  The next LVRC event is at Dunton Sunday 31^st of August.