Dull race, dull racer? - Andy Morrison Memorial Road Race - 5th April

It was a strange race on Saturday for a couple of reasons. 1) It was (surprisingly) only 40 miles long (must pay more attention to start sheets) 2) I managed to win the 60-strong bunch sprint despite feeling pretty lousy for most of the race. It was an early, cold, but bright start on Saturday in stark contrast to the previous weeks’ racing. Since the previous Sunday’s race I had felt pretty under the weather. I’d managed a couple of half decent interval sessions, and a pretty awful 60 miler over the previous 5 days but I didn’t line up with a whole lot of positive feeling.

The Andy Morrison Memorial Road Race is held over a 2 and a bit mile loop nr Cranfield University. The course has a 40mph descent followed by a long drag back to the top of the circuit, and a slightly undulating finishing straight. Repeat 18 times bringing to a slow boil. Truth be told it was a pretty dull race, that yours truly rode in a pretty dull way. The climb is the only place where things might split but it was a raging headwind and the bunch screamed round the rest of the circuit hovering up I don’t know how many wanabee attackers. Richard Simmons did manage to get clear early on, and was eventually joined by two other attackers with about 2 laps to go.  These three would go on to battle out the win.

I could talk you through the first 17 laps from my perspective but I’m not sure even I could stay awake long enough to tell it, so wouldn’t give you a lot of chance of staying awake long enough to read it. Suffice to say I spent my time following wheels and doing very little. The fact that over 60 riders started the last lap in the bunch tells you all you need to know about how hard (or otherwise) the race was. I started the lap towards the back of the field and held station on the fast descent.

As we turned left and begun the climb I positioned myself on the right hand side of the road and started to make progress. There was an attack near the bottom of the climb which served to string things out a little, and I was feeling alright and continued to ride up the outside of the bunch without exerting myself unduly. As the attack was caught there was the inevitable easing and I moved into the top 5. As we hit the turn Henry Latimer took it up and drove hard out of the turn onto the finishing straight. He would hold the front all the way to the last 100m.

With about 600m to go, I managed to get myself into third wheel over the next 3-400m. For the first time in the race I felt pretty good, and had that wonderful feeling of waiting to kick, but floating along holding the wheel and waiting. The last 200m had a slight downhill, with the last 100m or so being slightly uphill. It was in a crosswind so I thought it best to leave the jump a little later than normal. I kept expecting someone to come round me on the right, so was hyper alert to it. No one did. Instead the guy in front of me went on the left. This was it, and I kicked hard to Henry’s right. I remained in the saddle as I pulled level with him, and kicked again. I hit the front still seated and continued to power on crossing the line in 4^th place. This was probably the biggest bunch sprint I have won since coming back to the sport, and I can’t recall the last time I finished outside the top 3 in any sprint I have contested. I guess I can sprint a bit.

In some respects though this race left me a bit cold. Although it’s nice to finish well, I rode the race in a very negative way. I didn’t really learn a lot, nor did I stick my nose in the wind to make it difficult for myself, and look to improve. Last weekend was an infinitely more edifying ride. I guess in some respects that’s cycling I suppose. The history books record the results, but the mind and body record the experience in far more granular detail than words and numbers ever can.