Clifton CC

General view seems to be shift back to something hillier but aim to maintain the levels of effort. How about the west route (Bramham/Thorner/Scholes etc) this Saturday and east to Malton/Terrington the following week? After that you can decide whether to continue that pattern or throw in a lap session or two.

I'll be back in York on Friday afternoon for Easter break, so will try to be out on Saturday! Looking forward too it

Those rides are difficult in December, but the level of fitness is such now that they should be good rides.
Glad you decided to stop doing the laps and get back to proper training rides, but I'll be taking it steady this saturday, and changing the pads for carbon rim ones...Bring it on!!

"proper training rides"...? ...no wonder you've had that cough for three weeks

Should be out. See how far I get this time without being dropped!

Um....I might come along too - hang on as long as I can. I know I'm being daft but I'm thinking of doing an MTB race in a fortnight so a good beasting would do me no harm.

When is youre first race Darren?

Hi Tim

Doing the Dirtwheels race on sunday, think I might be racing with you the week after, somewhere in East Yorkshire

Can't make tomorrow......have a good ride

A touch chilly this morning after such a balmy week, and a stiff northerly promised lots of fun for later, but still a sizeable group of over a dozen set off from the square this morning. It all held together over the flatlands but by the first upward bits beyond Tadcaster the group began to shrink. Greg departed for better things elsewhere and despite the mass shedding of ballast at a pee stop beside the proposed RR circuit (territory marking) by the time we crossed the A64 just before Scholes it was down to six of us in the front group.

The reappearance of that stiff northerly ensured things got no easier and by the run-in to Sherburn Nigel T was shouting "I hope this is hurting you as much as it's hurting me" at me. A brief guest appearance by a very fluid-looking Darren - out checking his brake pads were correctly positioned on his very sexy carbon wheels prior to his season-opener - helped tow us to Cawood, and the last last leg to York really was last legs. Many thanks to Andrew Windrum for some big turns on the front, and some good, tight riding by all. 21.3mph average and 238W for the out-of-town chunk of the ride. Home, shower, fell asleep.

I know training isn't racing, but I reckon everyone in that front group should be seeing some brown envelopes this year. You all looked very strong.

As Phil says agood training ride this morning with agood core of probably near race fit riders .By the time we had done the lumps and had that head wind on the return it felt like a real test.80 miles on the clock when i got home but the last few were pretty snail like into the wind but i remember reading somewhere that the hard men always ride out with the wind and back into it Andrew was REAL strong.Good riding.
Good luck tomorrow Darren and Mart.Looking good today on those wheels
Well done Nigel for digging in til the end.

Really enjoyed the ride today, thanks guys First training ride of the year, and on my favourite of the routes as well! Enjoyed the hills thanks to my new toy, but didn't really appreciate the headwind on the way back. Andrew looked very strong, was very impresive how he always came back around for another turn on the front. Hopefully same again next week.

Thanks all

Good luck with your race tomorrow Darren! And Phil's right; those wheels looked lovely!

Good luck tomorrow to those at Dirtwheels!

A good ride today guys, really enjoyed it and finally managed to hang on to the end! Thanks for the various wheels that I spent a good amount of time following!

I found the mid section really hard- Tim and Andrew in particular were really motoring and I had to bury myself a few times to get on- thank goodness for the A64 traffic and the traffic lights at Sherburn.

Felt a little better once we got through Sherburn, and almost enjoyed the run back into York.

Thanks again for the help today, looking forward to next time