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Sun, 10 Jul 2005

It all came down to how fast I could ride for about 2 minutes - 16:19

First of all I need to tell Mikey that it did not rain, it tried damn hard but it was dry. I suspect the rain was scared off by the wind.
Anyhow onto the report. Forty nine souls riders and a bunch of dedicated race marshals lead by Rob braved the cold at Bungendore on Saturday for the Graded Scratch Race - Results Again, A and B grade were combined, this time A grade got lucky, they were not started a minute behind B. From the start the pace was brisk, with a cross wind blowing the riders to the centre line, it was almost easier to work through as opposed to dicing with the centre line. After a few little digs Simon got away at the start of the long climb, he only got away to take his jacket off, but found himself 50 metres up the road so he kept on going. The A graders looked at each other, so did the riders from B. At least we know that Simon was most definitely an A grade rider. Everybody know the chase would start, it’s not the first surge that really matters, it’s the counter that is the hard one. Anyhow, Mr. Eveready Dave Dickson(or Duracell) I can’t recall which little bunny wins decided to take up the chase. I don’t really know why because Dave is currently in B. Well, the hammer went down as soon as Dave eased up, Mark Harris and Tony O’Connor had the bunch strung out in single file. This lasted till the top of the hill where there was a slight easing and I was grateful to get a push from Richard Bourne to get me back into the fray.
The easy pace didn’t last long; every little pinch saw Mark or Dave put an effort in which has riders scrambling for wheels. I was covering most of the surges. Then Mark decided to put in a huge attack, only Tony and Howard Galloway were able to follow. I tried vainly, if only I could have gone faster for those two minutes or so. Mr. Eveready tried hard to close the gap, Mike Rawlin and Dave Sims had a go as well. Patrick Mc McNamara was there as well with a few strong turns. The only surprise was the lack of Damien Barrett surging though since he is normally the protagonist in situations like this. It turned out that Damien was having some tummy troubles. Dougie McLean on the comeback trail got us organising with some strong steady work as we hit the half way mark.
So, we worked and worked, ending up going into a block headwind barely moving at maybe 23-25kph. We had the breakaway three in sight, but Simon was well out of sight and out of mind. We never caught them. I lead out a slow motion sprint into a headwind and was very happy to see the finish line come up quicker than expected.
Sorry to hear about Al Lees who punctured early on, also I was quite surprised to see John Craig and John Thorn dropped since Thorny was very strong and did a splendid bunch caption job in the horror handicap the week before.

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