GCC Interclub Handicap - Race Report

Well, I had a top day at Breadalbane today at the GCC Interclub Handicap. A swarm of Vikings, (and more importantly Valkyries!) headed over for the event, with some of us driving over in convoy to Collector and then enjoying a 17km warm-up ride to Breadalbane on undulating country roads, with minimal traffic and majoral farm-life (cows and sheep galore!). I knew it was going to be a fun race at registration as the GCC reps on the rego desk were lovely and there were lollies.

There were 5 mins between each of the bunches, and I was in the 3rd bunch away. We rolled out and very soon had a well-working pace line formed. Everyone seemed very strong in our group, and there were quite a few big blokes that were pushing the pace up pretty early. I was feeling good though so kept pulling turns, and our Vikings / honorary Vikings crew were working really well together looking out for each other and giving advice re tactics, including when to respond to attacks, etc (big thanks to our lovely coach Simon D in this regard!). We hit a fairly flat / downhill section (which I must admit I didn't notice was downhill until the return journey!) and at that point I pretty much stopped pulling turns at the front and enjoyed getting a draft from a few of the bigger riders in the group.

Everyone had been talking about a hill at or near the turnaround, so I was most relieved when we hit a bit of a hill and I could see the bunch in front as I thought it was a good sign we were nearly halfway through the race. Sure enough, we started climbing and one of the GCC riders (# 17) went off the front, making it clear he was a pretty good climber. I tried to go with him but didn't really have the legs, so sat up and waited for everyone else at which point the Lee-train (we had two awesome Lees in our group!) came through and dominated and brought us all back together again.

We all enjoyed a brief moment of respite at the turnaround before we seriously started to think about catching the group in front. The turnaround was also good as we could see how much we had on the group behind, which didn't seem to be much at all! We decided to get a wriggle on to see if we could stay away and then our Vikings-train hit the gas and we were off. We then hit a fairly solid hill, which turned out to be the hill that everyone was talking about. I had seriously not noticed that we had descended down the hill on the way to the turnaround so was really surprised when I found I had to suddenly put in the hard yards and go uphill. I was still feeling pretty strong, so tried to sit on the front of our group and pace-make, and give the group in front plenty of warning when we were coming past so they could make the jump onto the back of our group. GCC rider #17 attacked at about this point, which was probably particularly good tactics on his part, but particularly poor on mine. I was shattered and didn't have the legs to go with him. But the gradient eased off a fraction, and a paceline started up again. I very much enjoyed the respite provided by Dave and Rach at this point (thanks guys!), but the gradient soon picked up again and I got back down into chase-mode. I had pretty much reconciled myself that I wasn't going to be able to catch GCC-rider #17 and basically sat up to go back to our group, at which point another GCC rider caught up to me (GCC-rider #18) and I jumped on his wheel for a free-ride up the rest of the hill. It hurt a lot staying on his wheel, but he was a big guy and I thought that if he managed to catch up to #17 then there would be no stopping the pair of them on the downhill, so I dug deep and hung in (only just, believe me!). We caught #17 near the top of the hill and I enjoyed a brief recovery section before I realised that #18 had started riding backwards (or so it seemed) and I was going to have to stop free-loading and start doing some work.

So #17 and I started pulling turns and somehow dropped #18. We were certain that we'd be caught by the group on the downhill as the two of us probably weighed not much more than a combined 100kgs. But we kept going, and going, and going. Each time I rolled off I'd look around and comment that I still couldn't see the chasers. The only problem was that I wasn't sure how far the race was, and I hadn't reset my Garmin after my warm-up, so I had no idea how much longer we had to go to the finish. I felt my legs starting to cramp on one of the final undulating sections, but somehow managed to stave it off to get over the line.

Coming towards the finish I was on the front, and knew it was going to be a sprint finish and the odds were stacked against me getting up. I started accelerating, trying to drop #17 as I knew he was tired and hurting, but he managed to dig deep enough to get around me and cross the line about half a wheel length in front of me. We chatted briefly at the end (when we had our breath back) and he was a lovely guy and I was really pleased for him that he'd raced so well as it turned out it was his first race back after a serious illness.

It was great watching everyone else coming through the finish line. Some excellent sprint finishes from some of our Vikings guys, but I think the day actually belonged to the ladies, with three of our ladies finishing in the top 10 overall (nice work Lee and Rach!). Goes to show that a race like a handicap can really be anyones if people work together properly and organise their groups. As for me, I was just lucky that it was hilly enough for me to get a gap and that I had such a great crew to work with for the first 2/3 of the race (and a big shout out to rider #18 for towing me back to the lead rider so that I could be part of the breakaway in the first place!). So thanks team!

We enjoyed some more Goulburn hospitality in the form of a BBQ after the ride, and then the Collector convoy jumped back on their bikes and tried to run the sunset gauntlet to get back to our cars before sundown. More beautiful country scenery, more fantastic company (albeit slightly more relaxed than during the race) and more great time spent riding our bikes.

Top day all round. :-)