H10/8 Charlotteville CC "10"

Racing pose

On a hot tip from Anna that fast times were likely down on the Bentley 10 mile time trial course, we duely entered a race there. It was a bit different from the usual "just turn up" situation Maidenhead CC operate on a Thursday night. We had to go enter online and pay up front. It cost a bit more but there was free cake promised. It was also a Saturday weekend ride, in the afternoon. So many changes.

It was quite a nice day, but rain was forecast. In the end we both managed to finish before the rain started, but it was a big field of about 100 riders.

Anna had her turbo trainer with her, and got started on the warmup after we had collected our numbers. I haven't managed to get any kind of structure to the pre-race, so just rode around a bit, eventually getting 15km in before my start.

The course is very like H10/2 in Maidenhead - you cycle down a main road in a fairly straight line towards a roundabout, turn around, and come back passing the start a little to the finish. This is a dual carriageway however, and a better road surface. The Garmin says 39m of climbing, versus 35m in Maidenhead, but it didn't feel like that.

I started with a climb, but it was fast, then some rolling terrain, and watching my average speed I could see I was slightly above my usual pace. I can't remember that much now about the rest of the race, except that I managed to stay fast. Maybe it was the smoother road conditions, or the wind direction, but as I approached the finish I suddenly noticed I was very closed indeed to 24 minutes, which is about a minute faster than my 10 mile TT record. I pushed towards the line, which was slightly hard to see so I wasn't quite sure when I would get there.

I actually got a time of 24:01 which I am massively pleased with, a new PB by a long way. I am not that disappointed to have missed the 24 target, a 23:59 would have been nice, but I have a target now to aim at - I never expected to get even close to 24 today.

I cycled around a bit to warm down, and went to a bridge overlooking the course to watch Anna going past. The women's starts were later, and I don't think the conditions were as good, but she still did a great time of 25:36.

We did get a small piece of cake afterwards :)

I came 58th out of 87 in the senior men category - it would be nice to be higher, but a PB is a PB and this one was a good one.


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Photo currently here Blinkmanphoto