S.E women's road race championships, by Kate.

I got lost on the way to the race and also ran out of petrol, so the car was chugging away. I was quite stressed when I got to the HQ but it was such a nice event ran by nice helpful people, and seeing a few people I knew including Anna and Ed - I chilled out a bit and thought I'd worry about the petrol situation after. 


I wanted to drive the course but didn't get time, so the first lap was spent taking everything in. The finish of the lap was on a hill, which I thought would suit me quite well. A few people tried attacks on this hill which I went with throughout the race but the bunch also went with it and no one managed to break. So after a while and realising that it was going to all come down to the last uphill stretch. Lou and I had a good chat and Lou even had a little sing song which made me laugh a lot. 



It all started to ramp up a bit on the final lap and people were trying to get in a good position. However all of a sudden the hill at the end seemed to look exactly the same the whole way up and I couldn't figure out where we were, so I went for it - only to realise that I had gone way too early as it dawned on me that the corner I was sprinting too was not the final corner - oooppss. I tried to keep it going as people started to come past me, including Lou who also misjudged the finish line and had gone for it, but managed to keep it going to get 3rd! I don't think I've ever tried so hard to hold on and came away with 7th. My chain came off about a half a metre before the line - which was ridiculously lucky really - had it of come off earlier it would have been so frustrating. I was annoyed with myself for getting over excited and going too early but it was so much fun and I loved it.

Anna's parents - Geraldine (who was also racing and said she really enjoyed it) and Marek were there to help me sort out my petrol situation. Marek got into boy scout mode and dismantled a pump to suck the petrol out of their car to put into mine - thanks guys..you rock!