TLI Anglesy Road Race

Sunday 4th September 2005

Hot weather. On Anglesey. In September. Never! But it was very hot.

Deeside were well represented for this race with Keith Jones, Mal Ridgway, Mike Jones and Chris Hughes in he under 50s, Norman Hughes, Mark Jones and myself in the under 40s and James Edwards in the juniors.

After a delay while we waited for some fella's wife to bring him his shoes! We set off on the 51 mile circuit. Without a thermometer I couldn't tell you how hot it actually was, lets just say it was very hot and humid for the time of year, so the pace was slower from other years. No-one would take the initiative and so attacks were few in the first 10 miles. After around 18 miles a small attack got caught so I went with two other riders, they wouldn't work so I sat up and let the bunch catch back up. That's when Norman made his move. Even though he wasn't anywhere near his usual race fitness he pulled away from the bunch, three or four riders tried to catch him but he managed stay away to take the win.

The heat was taking it's toll on the main field, on the longest climb of the course, an injection of pace at the front, whittled down the group to 10 riders. One of the casualties of the increase in pace was Mark who suffered with cramps after riding a strong race up to that point.

With around 6 miles to go, up a short steep climb, I had a bad attack of cramp and had to stop for a second to shake it off. I got back on the bike and thought that I would just have to ride in alone. I put it in a low gear and started to spin and started to feel better and noticed I was starting to catch the main bunch, so I put my head down and chased. It took me a couple of miles but I got back on. I sat on the back and recovered. With about 1 km to go the first attack came, far to soon, I got on a wheel and waited to see who would go first. When the final sprint started I was 8th wheel, I moved past 3 or 4 riders quite easily and with about 200 yds to go launched myself at the line, I couldn't get out of the saddle because of cramp, but took the sprint by a bike length for second place.

Keith Jones took first in the under 50s and James took first in the juniors with everyone else finishing in the main groups. Apologies if I forgot anyone.

Cramp and dehydration seemed to of taken it's toll on a lot of the competitors including Mal who had to pull out suffering in the heat.

The full result can be seen HERE as a PDF.

Thanks to Ian Edwards for this report

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