MuleBar GIRL

Sitting on the sofa and my legs are pooped. In fact, most of me is pooped. This was a pretty heavy weekend of racing and riding. Across the country riders have been battling it out on the road for the regional championships and yesterday in the South East was the women’s only champs, thanks to the Surrey League and Kingston Phoenix the hosting club. Yesterday saw a record start of over 60 riders and some hard fought racing.

Lou, Sarah and I were on the line up and at the front from the get go. The course had a slight uphill towards the finish but was largely only slightly rolling. With attacks and counter attacks going from the first time up the hill I was really enjoying myself getting in the mix of action. Unfortunately despite our best efforts nothing seemed to stick. I had a dig, Lou had a dig, Sarah had a dig, repeat. We saw lots of air between us and the bunch with other riders joining to try and make sustainable breaks but the bunch was not keen on letting anyone go. If the photos are anything to go by though, you can’t say we didn’t try. One of us in off or on the front in almost every one!

As we approached the hill for the last time it was a close call between Karla Boddy (High Wycombe CC) and Lydia Boylan (Look Mum No Hands) in the sprint for the line. Karla took it by a whisker with Lydia taking the South East Champs jersey. I’m really impressed with how hard the whole peleton raced, echoed by some spectators I was chatting to at the end.

Thankfully my legs didn’t feel too bad this morning as it was my club, Twickenham CC’s interclub time trial champs where riders from Hounslow & District Wheelers and Westerley CC and TCC are pitted against each other over a 25 mile handicap course. I won it a few years back when I was given a 20 minute handicap but no one was quite as nice to me this morning! To get a few extra miles in I rode the 2 hours there which seemed like a great idea until it was time to ride the two hours back. All I wanted to do was yawn and sleep! Still, it’s all good training and has given me plenty of excuse to sit on the sofa tonight and dream of next week when it’s supposed to be 22 degrees – Yey!

Also, wishing a speedy recovery to Lisa Gunn (WyndyMilla) who came down pretty hard – hope to see you back on the bike soon!

Natalie xx