We had a really rather nice morning for the Befordshire Road CC Charity ’25’. This was particularly welcome after a couple of frankly rather soggy and cold events. The sun was shining, and there was only a gentle (but rising) head wind to the turn, and a fast trip back.

The North Bucks fielded three riders at this event - it was nice to have a bit of company from the NBRC at the HQ! I was the last of three to start, and had a decent run to the turn, though I did get delayed at the Sandy roundabout. I made it to the turn in about 30 minutes.

This event, as well as contributing to the NBRC club time trial league, was also the NBRC Championship ’10’. Accordingly I was pretty keen to ride. I ignored comments from work colleagues that rain was forecast, and rode up to Stagsden without a rain jacket, which turned out to be a bad move.

On the road up to Astwood, a startlingly heavy rain shower came over, so heavy that at times I could barely see where I was going. This had the effect of completely soaking me (and others riding to the event), so I was shaking with cold by the time I signed on. A second shower while we were ‘warming up’ meant most of us were shivering when lined up at the start.

When I heard the 2015 VTTA Championship was to be held of the famous ‘cheatie’ course in South Wales in July 2015, I was obviously interested. Not only was this an opportunity to ride on what may well be the fastest ‘25’ course in the country, but it would be an opportunity to visit ‘Grumpy’ Art Vanderlay (aka Gerry) in the summer, with the attendant good weather not usually seen when I usually race 2-up in March.Oh, how well-laid plans fail. The drive over on Friday was horrid, with masses of traffic, really bad weather and it took 6 hours. Saturday was some kind or compensation – we had nice weather for a jaunt out to the Welsh National Botanic Gardens followed by watching the Alpe d’Huez stage of the Tour de France.Unfortunately the weather for the R25/3L on Sunday morning was completely awful. In the end Gerry decided not to ride, and of 150 on the start sheet (plus reserves), only 57 finished the event. It was very windy – 22mph plus 35mph gusts -  but also very wet and cold. Quite ridiculous for an event in the last weekend in July.Gerry, having decided not to ride, kindly took me round for a second recce of Neath Bank before returning me to the start. Somewhat dubiously I rode to the start. Off I went, and almost immediately got blown so suddenly I felt my bike was moving sideways. Composing myself after that burst of adrenalin, I carried on across the industrial estate roundabout. I managed to miss the subtle left pointing arrow at the next roundabout and almost didn’t make the turn onto the A465 (there wasn’t a marshal).Then it was on to the famous Neath Bank. I have to confess I took this cautiously, maxing at about 43mph. But I thought this was sensible. The rid out to the next turn was reasonably quick. I saw Gerry on the roadside trying to take a picture with his phone. Fortunately I’m quite familiar with the turn, as the Port Talbot Wheelers’ 2-up event turns there – it’s quite a confusing turn, and there was a multitude of signage but only a single marshal.We’d expected the wind to provide a bit of assistance after the Aberdulais turn. Sadly, this turned out not to be the case, and I had a bit of a grind to the finish with a nagging headwind for most of it.I finished with 56:15 (+12:50), and I was reasonably happy with that, given the conditions.We then dashed back to get cleaned up and drive out to our favourite local restaurant, Y Polyn, for a slap up feed that pretty much made me soporific for the rest of the day!Result at the VTTA website. 

After the Norlond ‘10’ a week and a half earlier, I was optimistic that I’d have a good ride in this evening club event, especially since the conditions were really rather good! Unfortunately, an encounter with a car at the mid-way Marston Moretaine roundabout delayed me a bit, and left me in a state of disarray!I really struggled during this event and finished with 22:27. Even taking the incident at the roundabout into account, I didn’t seem to be firing on all cylinders!Still, I had high hopes for the weekend’s VTTA ‘25’ Championship.Results at the NBRC website.

We had a nice evening for this event, in contrast to my ride to work on the P5 through pretty damp conditions. I also picked up a flint that penetrated my front tyre. I booted the tyre while at work, and got it reasonably inflated before riding out to Stony Stratford for the evening's time trial. I arrived to find quite a few riders lined up to sign on - in total we had 15 riders.I found the outbound leg tough as usual - but I thought my speed was even slower than usual, especially on the climb to Nash. Anyway, once through Nash, things picked up a little, and certainly after the turn I felt pretty good. It was a bit irritating therefore to be stopped by a car backing out of a drive and then sitting stationary in the road. I passed this car (the driver said something to me as I passed, but I couldn't catch it) and quickly got up to speed.I roared down the hill to Beachampton at a pretty good lick, before coping with the turns, rough surfaces and generally draggy sections of the course and finishing. I ended up with 27:11, to take the win this evening. I was left wondering if I'd have sneaked a long 26 had I not been delayed by that car!Results (at the NBRC website) 

This open ’10’ was on the by now familiar F15/10 Brogborough course. I rode out to the HQ in the Marston Social Club in plenty of time. I was planning on wearing one of my skinsuits modified with a NoPinz number pocket, so I took the skinsuit in a backpack along with my aerohat. It was quite clear on the ride out that the time trial would be affected by a headwind on the return leg (and, of course, would benefit from a tailwind on the way out).

Having got my number sorted in my skinsuit, I changed into it and set out for the start. I arrived, as usual, ridiculously early and after a quick circuit of Brogborough I decided to hang around at the start. The pusher-off was pretty good - using a single hand he very effectively held me upright and set me off well.

This event was the club’s time trial championship, and as usual was held over two laps of the Astwood circuit. As for the other events on the course, we used the revised version that starts and finishes near the BikeBus cafe (and most recently modified to start further from houses).

The evening was pretty nice and warm, not so hot as it was for last week’s event. Unfortunately the wind seemed to get up rather a lot, which gave me some concerns. When I reached the signing on about half an hour before the start, I was surprised to find myself signing on as number 18 - clearly a good turnout! In fact we had 21 riders, at least one of whom was riding a time trial for the first time. As an aside, the North Bucks Road Club are planning a third “Come and try it” time trial in August, as this year we seem to have managed publicity more effectively!

The hottest day of the year saw 13 riders lining up for a club event on the Stoke Hammond course in very hot and humid conditions. It was actually around 37^oC for the race! I arrived quite early, as Tony was setting out some signage and I ended up hanging about, beating off the horse flies that plagued us. In fact, as I write this a few days after the event, I’m suffering several itchy bites!

Anyway, that didn’t really dent my performance. What dented that was the stiff old headwind out on the dual carriageway, and particularly on the rise up to the turn roundabout. By the time I reached the dual carriageway section, my mouth had dried up and got rather gummy. This made things a bit worse than I’d have liked! It was, of course a consequence of removing my bottle cage after the debacle on the Brogborough course the other week.

Our 2015 tour was organised after a winter and spring in which our cycling had been seriously curtailed by pressure of work. Accordingly (a) we desperately needed a break, and (b) I needed to be quite conservative about projected daily mileage.

In which I almost bottle out, then lose my bottle!

After last week's relatively balmy conditions, this evening was a bit of a shock. Unseasonably cold, and with a very strong head wind for the out bound leg, this event was always going to be 'interesting'.Over the past week, I'd been having a bit of trouble with the front brake on my P5 bike. I had stupidly screwed the pressure point adjustment screw too far in, to the point the brake was no longer functional. This required a tricky disassembly and then re-filling the system with oil. It took a fair bit of application to do this. It wasn't until the day of the race that I finally got this sorted out!  There had also been some kind of serious accident on the course on the previous week (I don't know the details, but sadly I think it involved several fatalities). This had needed some kind of repairs to the roadside barriers, and threatened a weekend open event, though it was cleared by Wednesday evening.Anyway, I rode over in time to sign on as #22. I got cold at the start! The initial descent was a little alarming, with the wind buffeting my front H3, and I decided discretion was the better part of valour and didn't attempt to use the tribars. At the bottom of the hill, I could see a large collection of flowers left at the roadside, but the newly repaired tarmac and barriers, which sort of stuck in the mind a bit.Once down the hill, it was quite odd, with my speed varying between low 20s and well over 27 mph, presumably depending on a mix of gradient and exposure to the headwind. I wasn't too troubled by this most of the way, and anyway was looking forward to the return leg! I had no traffic holdups at either the first or the turn RAB, and I set off on the return.I quickly found myself flying back. Sadly, I was zooming along at around 30mph over one of the rougher sections of tarmac when I heard a bang and a clatter, and I saw black object leap off my bike, bounce of my transmission and disappear back off down the road. My first reaction was that it was one of the front brake shrouds (remember I'd been fiddling with the front brake), so I jammed the anchors on. At least the front brake did work! It turned out to be the bottle, now minus its cap. I retrieved the bottle and set off again, cursing myself for not just carrying on (after all, a capless aero bottle isn't much use).The rest of the race was pretty uneventful, though the stop must have cost me quite a bit of time, especially since I found myself starting a in a mammoth gear! Still, you live and learn!Next up should be the Hemel Hempstead '10' on the F11/10 on Saturday. After missing some events due to pressure of work, I'm keen to ride, even if the forecast weather leaves something to be desired!

Pos	No	Name	Club	Time	Cat	Vets Std	.+ / -	Vets Std
1	6	Ady Dench	Sheffrec CC	22.15	V46	26.27	.+ 4.12	1
2	13	Richard Golding	Equipe Velo	23.02	V46	26.27	.+ 3.25	2
3	21	Jason Lee	TeamMK	23.24	V46	26.27	.+ 3.03	5
4	23	Lindz Barral	Equipe Velo	23.28	Sen
5	22	Robert Saunders	NBRC	23.47	V55	27.09	.+ 3.22	3
6	19	Andy Wickham	NBRC	23.57	V44	26.18	.+ 2.21	9
7	24	Tim Bailey	TeamMK	24.01	V48	26.36	.+ 2.35	.= 6
8	15	Graham Line	NBRC	24.10	V50	26.45	.+ 2.35	.= 6
9	16	Alan Crane	Chronos RT	24.14	V46	26.27	.+ 2.13	10
10	18	Kevin Creese	Chronos RT	24.27	V61	27.44	.+ 3.17	4
11	9	Ant Newland	Bossard Wheelers	24.32	V49	26.41	.+ 2.09	12
12	12	Dave Price	NBRC	24.51	V47	26.32	.+ 1.41	14
.=13	5	Graham Mackie	Corley Cycles	24.52	V53	26.59	.+ 2.07	13
.=13	14	Jacob Tresham	Corley - Drops RT	24.52	Jnr.
15	11	Ian Markham	Chronos RT	25.02	V46	26.27	.+ 1.25	15
16	8	Paul Woodham	Bossard Wheelers	25.54	V64	28.06	.+ 2.12	11
17	4	Dave Brown	Leighton Buzzard Roads CC	25.58	V66	28.23	.+ 2.25	8
18	3	Ian Stokes	45 Road Club	26.19	V55	27.09	.+ 0.50	17
19	17	David Creese	Chronos RT	26.49	V63	27.59	.+ 1.10	16
20	7	Trevor Watson	Bossard Wheelers	27.20	V56	27.14	.- 0.06	19
21	20	Luke Daniells	NBRC	28.12	V42	26.09	.- 2.03	20
22	10	Helene Wight	Corley Cycles	28.31	LV52	29.03	.+ 0.32	18
23	2	Dave Crane	Chronos RT	31.26	V50	26.45	.- 4.41	22
24	1	John Pick	Chronos RT	32.39	V70	29.02	.- 3.37	21
Time keepers:- Steph Cousins & Tony Farmborough NBRC
Pusher off:- Bryan Scarborough. NBRC