by
AndyM
Sun May 04, 2014 5:15 pm
Ilkley Avanti Gas 2-day for me.
Stage One was 54 miles of the Pennypot Lane circuit at Beckwithshaw. Some serious power in the bunch and it certainly felt like it - 't was a hard race. Lots of folks jumping off the front and being brought back as no-one wanted to let anyone gain time in the first stage. As a result, the top 50 riders finished together in a big bunch kick with John and self safely in the bunch around 35th position. The best I felt over each lap was up that final climb of Bland Hill, so was a big disappointment to have positioned myself so poorly on the run in, and in the whole race to be honest. 304W NP.
After 2.5 hours of working on the tan it was time for Stage Two. This was a team time trial of about 4.5 miles, over 2.5miles of which was climbing. Was a real shame that Damian wasn't able to start and so John and I lined up for our 2-up, both worried how our legs would feel after the morning's stage. Turned out I actually felt great, better than I had in the morning, and we clocked a time of 13:03 which was quicker than a few teams with 3 guys, and just over 1 min slower than the quickest team. 357W NP.
Stage Three was 44 miles of the Darley/Dacre circuit which basically comprises of hills and descents, and more hills - we covered a cool 1300m of vertical ascent in the 44 miles of the race. We were lucky enough to have a strong headwind over the hardest part of the circuit too. I was feeling really good at the start actually, had recovered well and wasn't feeling too uncomfortable in the bunch. But once again I was terribly positioned and just struggled to move up and, as a result, was dropped after two out of 5-and-three-quarter laps. My peak 60 minute wattage included about 30mins of solo riding, so clearly I had the power to stay in the pack, I just really need to work on my positioning and moving up the bunch - especially on circuits like that where this is critical. I settled in to a nice solo ride to the finish, with a little bit of company from ones and twos along the way. Happy to finish such a hard race to be honest, a lot of people didn't finish the stage (edit: from the results 28 riders didn't finish the stage) so it's a small victory to get to the end. 336W NP for the first hour 326W for the first hour and a half, and 306W for the whole race, and I was suitably spent at the finish.
Very well ridden by John and Damian - both were riding very well yesterday and John rode well today too, and also have to say the event was fantastically organised and would love to go back and race again next year after learning from my mistakes!
EDIT: Full results now up, and I finished 34th overall and John finished 37th out of 75 starters.
Last edited by AndyM on Sun May 04, 2014 6:50 pm, edited 2 times in total.