Club Notes - 11th July 2004

Whether it’s the weather or events earlier in the year that have taken the toll on the competition side of the club is uncertain. For my part I’ve been having a bit of an iffy season both equipment and physically in fact this years seen more DNS’s (Did not start) and DNF’s (Did not finish) next to my name then most seasons put together so YT as decided to call the rest of the open season and if my last outing was anything to go by not before time! However I will still be putting in an appearance in the Congleton 10’s and before I abandoned the bike a part from this once a week outing I joined Paul (Whiz) Whiston and his brother Gary along with Graham Jones for an impromptu ride out on Sunday morning for a very pleasant and surprisingly dry trip to Eccelshall although the slopes of Barlaston did prove a bit of a challenge. These rides, Whiz has informed me, are a regular occurrence meeting out side the club house, Den Engel’s for the initiated at 9.30 going where the wind blows, they are informal but worth turning up if your at a loose end of a Sunday morning. So although the weather is dampening the spirits of some in the club its good that cycling in the town in general is still going strong, and proves that its not all about being lycra clad racers a sentiment echoed by our mile muncher Graham Halden in his piece about his lead up to the 24 hour challenge. Believe me even some of us ‘racers’ aren’t into racing when a social event such as the last muffin ride and the up and coming Clubs Birthday ride are taking place, and as I said earlier my appearances at the Congleton 10’s are as much about chatting as racing.

This does lead me nicely onto the last two such events first on the 29^th of June and Leek provided 3 of the 10 taking part, (which indicates the general drop off is not just a Leek C.C. problem) of the 3 Mark Poyser in a rare but welcome visit was the quickest Leek rider coming in second to Congleton's own Karl Austin, who is still on fine form despite being in the middle of his 100 mile time trial part of the season Marks time of 23-04 to Karl’s 22-45 shows that like YT, Marks having a bit of a dip. My dip got even deeper at 23-34 whilst stalwart and possibly the member whose completed more than most on a Tuesday Kevin Pickford just missed a 28 minute ride at 29-01, Leaping forward a week to the 6^th of July and Kev made the most of a switch to the Monks Heath course going almost a minute quicker at 28-11, whilst I managed all of 8 seconds at 23-26, just pipping Karl’s 23-27 and behind Dukinfields Rob Nelson 23-12, although significantly both of them had ridden a somewhat trial by weather 100 mile event round Cheshire the Sunday before Karl finishing in the top 10 whilst Rob winning the event outright. The winner of the 10 however was Jon Waddilove of Crewe Clarion Wheelers who is doing rather well in the open races at the moment himself as demonstrated by finishing almost a minute clear at 22-17.

For those of you wondering what's happened to the flying Ipstonian Rich Brooks he’s returned to his first discipline of Triathlon for a couple of events and reports that his cycling has helped immensely, knocking minutes of his bike section whilst only gaining a few seconds on his running. A trade off that earned him an overall time of 2-04-05 giving him 4^th in the 30-39 age group behind Chris McAteer 2-00-11 and 7^th overall behind event winner Carl Phillips 1-59-39, which is especially impressive when you consider that the event, "The Dambuster” held at Rutland Water, is a National ranked event attracting 335 entries! Riches assertion that his time trialing is a key factor being underlined by being second fastest time split, missing out by just 5 seconds for the bike section behind Julian Jenkins who as well as being a top level Triathlon as been featuring prominently in time trials himself including a high finish in this years National 50. Its just a pity that some of us aren’t rising to Rich’s level otherwise I’m sure we would picking up some team awards. Even now the Club is lying 3^rd in the Manchester and District Time trial Association league almost entirely due to performances at the start of the season. Still, as a certain Arnie is wont to say "I’ll be back" or in the Clubs case "We’ll be back".

Next week my ‘senior moment” in a 10 forgetting a somewhat important part of kit! The final countdown to Graham Haldens 24 have you done your bit and guessed his mileage for charity go on it’s a good excuse to pop into the clubhouse! And the date for the club birthday! Till next week keeping dodging the showers