ROCKITRIDEIT

anyone know the guy in the yellow deVer kit in the right-hand foreground? (note: not deVere kit!!!) that is a south london club, he's probably from my neck of the woods

dude, we are not all as strong as you, even pacelining wears us older guys out care to tell us how your first SV race went? I saw your result on racetec....

Our wolfpack took 6th, 9th and 10th places yesterday. However we obviously have "cycling etiquette" not "winning" at the core of our values it would appear, as thedailycrank who finished 6th chose not to contest the final sprint because he had, in his own words, sucked wheel all day and it didn't feel right. Now this is all well and good, except that I dropped off the bunch with 10km to go and had to solo to the finish with no water cos of the turns I had taken on the front and the early efforts....only for thedailycrank to then decide he'd rather avoid any bad karma In the post race debrief in the car on the way home, he was admonished and ordered to sprint like his life depended on it next time!! haha as I said it is all a learning curve and still very much "fun" for us!!

There is no official team competition so in effect we are all racing for individual points, but yes you are 100% correct that there are clubs/teams in the Cat with a number of riders, notably Cedar and Mohammediyah who seem to be well represented in numbers terms. Me and my buddies are a wolfpack of 3 who wear the same kit cos we rode the DC together, but that's as far as it goes in terms of team tactics as we've never "raced" before, so this is all a learning curve

Hey Dommisse/David, good to meet you yesterday, I was in the blue/white deVere kit on the red/white Pinarello. Ross

Will see you at Bouckert dude. turns out I finished 9/52 in the end today, pretty happy with that for the 1st race at this level

Leturbo, saw you roll into the finish area with a smile and 1000 yard stare. I gave you a shout but I think you were only focused on your medal and getting a coke. Mtbroadie, pleased to meet you buddy, seriously strong ride from you today, deserved that podium recognition! I suffered from the early efforts over helz and trying to get the break, dropped off our Stars breakaway with 10km to go and finished 5 minutes after you in a time of approx 3h.

I am a pom who's lived here in CT on and off for a few years now. please don't hold either of those things against me.... I cycled for a number of years in and around London both as my daily commute to Canary Wharf and also for leisure/training. In London the volume of traffic is higher, the number of people greater, the levels of stress arguably higher, the roads narrower, the weather (and visibilty) crappier, the buses bigger and redder but just as dangerous, and the taxis smaller and blacker but just as dangerous. On my London commute I found that I was ofen the fastest moving vehicle on the road given how jammed up London traffic could be, and there are dedicated cycle superhighways, cycle lanes and bikes are allowed use of bus lanes as well. This all made for a relatively safe and quick commute. ipod-wearing peds typically represented the most danger as they would obliviously walk out inbetween vehicles right in front of you, so you always had to have your wits about you. As Saffers don't walk anywhere there isn't really the same ped danger. As LL said cycling in the UK has had a popularity explosion in recent years, the Mayor of London introduced the bike hire scheme (sponsored by Barclays) and there were tax breaks for employers and employees buying bikes for the purpose of commuting. The increased numbers of cyclists on the roads, especially inexperienced cyclists, has I believe resulted in higher accident numbers...it is simply a numbers game. Here in CT I find the roads just as safe/dangerous (glass half full/empty) as in London. yes the roads are wider but the traffic tends to move much more quickly on average, rarely am I the fastest moving vehicle on the road. I have had 2 accidents here in the last few years, one was at the tokai circle when a car turned left in front of me without indicating, and the driver hapily paid for all my repairs, no harm done. The other accident was ironically the fault of a british tourist who had decided there was a photo opportunity not to be missed on chappies, so he brought the car to a complete halt on the descent into hout bay full in the middle of the road...i introduced my head to his rear windscreen and my front rim had seen better days, but again no harm done. Errmmm to sum up my rambling, I guess as cyclists we need to think not only for ourselves but also do the thinking for other road users and peds as well, as we are vulnerable out there.

Unfortunately I can't make it either, its date night with the wife as we have the nanny looking after our 3 month old boy...haven't yet managed to convince her that an evening in Killarney is the perfect romantic setting for dinner. Plus if I raced tonight I would be stukkend for the SSI lab tomorrow at 7am!

who is the colonel?

Hey LL, I also did the study with Ben, top bloke and really interesting to compare my 4 x 40km TT stats over the course of the study, and also the mental aspect of pushing yourself on an indoor bike for over an hour...found myself in some dark places at halfway stage. Ben has his own motivational techniques though.... I'm actually going in to the SSI tomorrow morning for my VO2 max test and to get my structured training program, looking forward to getting back in the lab for some weird reason!

congrats dude, now I REALLY wish I'd bridged to you on ou kaapse. I went up from G to F (although we both started in H group on Sunday). Are you going to upgrade your seeding ahead of 99er, which is the next non-league race I think on 11 Feb?

so when PPA F group comes by, and all the stars sit-in, what then?

I am supposed to be a G as well. but having entered the league stars cat I didnt see any point in upgrading now

thanks, it could have been my funeral otherwise

Well done Zac, all we need now is PPA to use a ridiculous Beta index based on your "winning" time for the next seeding run

what happened? i heard you attacked and soloed from fish hoek and then a marshall took you the wrong way? have PPA sorted the result?

Good work today fella!! With hindsight I should have worked harder to bridge the gap to you on Ou Kaapse, but didnt want to go all out so early in the race. mistake! Look forward to meeting you in the Stars bunch next week!! Ross

its hard to see properly through the salt tears

FRAIL did you try to tag onto the group at that point?? Was it you who dropped me that dead wheel??!? haha or were you wearing black kit today, and we passed you just outside simonstown? I said howzit as we passed? you weren't wearing your CWC kit today i'm sure me and my mate in blue/white deVere team kit

started in H group, honest pace to the foot of ou kaapse. A group of 10-15 formed on the climb and moved away at the front, i was in 2nd group of about 10 riders, thought process was just to take it easy-ish up ou kaapse, wind at the top was ridiculously hectic, difficult to even hold a straight line, touching of wheels brought down 2 riders behind me, a man and a lady, hope both you and your bikes are ok guys. The crash and my teammate punctured at the top of ou kaapse meant we were down on numbers, still we flew down ou kaapse in pursuit until hectic wind again as we entered sun valley, the wind was funnelling through there. our group was down to 6 now, me, my other teammate, 2 C seed riders who were working hard to help a H seed mate of theirs, plus 1 other guy. we stay together through kommetjie, scarborough and towards the reserve. HEADWIND of note! we spy the breakaway up the road and the 2 C seed guys try to bridge, too strong for the rest of us, they shelled their mate and the other guy, then us. From the top of smits the 2 of us picked up a nice tailwind, and we shared the workload to the finish, overtaking quite a few guys and never getting caught by the rest of H group or anyone. We finished in 2h20, with a 31kph average, but although it was only a short race it felt very very tough on the legs. I am stukkend now! Chatting to the guys at the end I found out that the C seeds never caught the H breakaway, flip with hindsight maybe it would have been best to all stick together on the road past the reserve, but to be fair they were clearly stronger than us and did the lion share of the work on the road leading up to the reserve.

wind?? pah!! moffs the lot of ya! i'm gonna MTFU, break away up Ou Kaapse, solo through the mother of all headwinds that awaits on the false flat from Scarborough to Smits, divebomb down through Simonstown, fly like a speeding bullet with that tailwind to Boyes, attack again on that beeeyatch of a gradient, hammer the rollers, and take the glory. or i could wake up and smell the nescafe, and hide in the bunch until Reddam

ooooh, you guys are a bit tasty aren't you? we'll be in blue/white deVere kit

I emailed the Cycle Tours guy Eulogy du Plessis and he said he is trying to drum up support for a team format for the Stars Cat, but that its a relatively new Cat with riders of different ages etc etc. Teams must be a minimum of 3 riders and wearing same kit. My mates and I will be riding in team kit and sure we'll be working together and happy to work with anyone else who wants to. I'm curious as to what happened in the Spring and last Summers races to generate the negative views. Surely if it was attack after attack the Stars bunch would have gone slower and been caught by the PPA group starting behind, no? At which point it would be a case of riding in that bunch and trying to keep tabs on the other league riders? Having ridden a few times at Killarney last year I really enjoy the racing side, but obviously also in the back of our minds is still doing a good time to improve seedings and ultimately qualify for sub-vets.

ok so despite the reservations of some hubbers, me and a couple of mates have entered the Stars in Training category for the Summer League. Although we are "in training" we have definitely missed the stardom boat as we are all in our mid-30s and seeded G/H by PPA Nevertheless it will be interesting to experience the racing side rather than just the fastest-time side to these rides. Is anyone else entered for this Cat?