Thetford Winter Series 2014/2015 - Round 4

Round 4 : Brandon Country Park : 22nd February
With a 13th at round 1 and 21st at both rounds 2 and 3 I was sitting in 7th overall in the series standings.

In the weeks leading up to the race I'd found my pace has improved quite a bit and my single-track handling was back to something like normal, so I was hopeful of being further into the top 20 this time.

The morning was cold but bright and the forecast said it should warm up as the morning went on, rain wasn't due until an hour or so after the race. I decided to trust the weather man and opted for non-winter gear, baring my legs and leaving the winter boots in the car!

Although I was gridded I wasn't comfortable with my position in the pen and got off to an apprehensive start, feeling I could put more power down but not finding it easy to jostle among the other riders. After the first couple of fire-road bends there was a long straight where I managed to push onwards and was able to retake a few places before the first section of single-track.

The course was excellent, with lots of single-track and with a surprising amount of climbing. TMTBR had been a bit evil with the end of the loop which took us up the bottom of the Plumb-buster then across and up the Nutcracker (very narrow and steep)!

I can't have lost too many places as I didn't find much in the way of hold-ups along the course but the poor start niggled at me for the rest of the race. Lap 3 was eerily quiet and forcing myself to push on was hard without other riders around to pace myself with. I played a game of imaging Ady and Wingar were just around the corner ahead and I was trying to close them down...  At the start of lap 4 Karen told me that Cavey wasn't too far ahead which spurred me on for the final lap (even though he's in a different cat). Around half-way through the lap I caught a few glimpses of him in the distance and finally, at the bottom of the Plumb-buster I managed to catch and pass him, but found a slow queue heading up the Nutcracker. At the top I chased after a couple of others from the queue (not knowing if they were in my cat or not) along a draggy straight to the finish line but wasn't able to catch them.

Once again I'd targeted a top 20 finish, and as I'd gone into this round feeling stronger than last time I'd hoped on a reasonable improvement on the 21st place I'd finished in the last 2 times.

I turns out the 2 blokes I was chasing at the end were in my cat after all, and I finished 19th (7s off 17th!). The full series rankings haven't been published but after fiddling with a spreadsheet I think I've worked out that I finished 11th in the series overall.

I had hoped all the training would have got me a few places nearer the top 10 but it can't be helped. I suspect a weak start and not having anyone to chase in lap 3 cost me a few places. This is my last year as a Senior and I'll be a vet next time round, if I'd been in that cat yesterday I'd have finished 11th...

Roll on next season...