Monday 25 January 2010

Hillingdon SprintFest

Hi all,

Anybody here fancy the hillingdon Sprint Fest that John Leitch is putting on 14th Feb. Looks like a good training session!


Its a few hours on sprint training! Me, Mark Workman and James Graham are going so be good see any other Festival Faces! Here is more info! (Copied from the PowerPack email). Maybe see some of you there!


Improve your sprinting at the Hillingdon SprintFest

Coaching with a focus on power and tactics

There will be training exercises both with a lead-out man and where you’ll be going head-to-head on your own.

So you’ve trained hard this winter, done plenty turbo sessions, and you now think you can win races in 2010…..you think you could be handy when it comes to a bunch finish but how do you know?

This is a themed afternoon of coaching/training aimed at helping you hone those skills you need to do well in the last 200m.

Date: Sunday February 14

Venue: Hillingdon cycle circuit.

Time: 1.00pm (signing on from 12.30pm)

Finishing: 3.00pm-4.00pm…. depending on numbers and weather.

Club priority: teams of four will make for the best session… so rustle up three of your club-mates and come as a group.

On the agenda at the SprintFest will be a series of training races including:

  • longer two-lap races with each sprinter getting a lead-out train of three riders
  • shorter one-lap races with each sprinter getting a single lead-out rider
  • head-to-head sprints between two matched riders
  • head-to-head sprints between groups of four riders

Priority given to clubs fielding groups of four.

But not everyone will be in such a fortunate position, so there should be room for all combinations…. single riders, riders coming in pairs as well as groups of three…… whatever, we should be able to allocate you to a team of four when necessary.

Cost of places:

£12 in advance – members of clubs registered with the Surrey Cycle Racing League

£15 in advance – other riders

£22 on the day*

(*please note: a coach has an upper limit of 20 riders so once those places have gone then any additional riders turning up would have to be turned away…. on the other hand if numbers of advanced bookings were strong that would trigger me to make a move to track down another coach)

For more information on the Hillingdon SprintFest: please contact John Leitch.


Sunday 24 January 2010

Winter Club Rides "go large" with Mechanical Mayhem!

Another great club ride today from Epsom with the biggest turnout of the year so far, with 6 keen and mile hungry riders. Alan Fidgett, Roger Smith, Trevor Keenan, Noel and Lawrence Manchee and myself set off in dry, bright but fresh conditions.

Out through the back streets of Ashtead, Leatherhead and Bookham to Effingham and up over the North Downs ridge. A swift descent down White Downs to hit the mucky Surrey lanes. First blood was Roger hitting the mother of all potholes to blow out the front tyre. A swift change and onwards through Holmbury (without the snow for a change) towards Forest Green. Next was Lawrence's turn with an usual shortage of chain ring bolts causing his inner ring to fall loose. With a bit of allen key juggling and a donated chainring bolt from Trevor we were back on the road for a well earned tea stop at Helfold Lakes. Home for lunch and 40 miles - 15.5mph

Thanks all for a great ride and see you next week, same time same place

Sunday 17 January 2010

Winter Club Rides

Hi

Today was the 1st Winter Club ride of 2010. Noel Manchee, Mark Bixley and myself met in Epsom and for a change, in bright, sunny and much warmer conditions.

After the heavy rain yesterday, the roads through Cobham and out to Horsley were quite flooded and snow still piled at the roadsides on the hilltops. Mark showed some impressive new year strength over the Newlands ridge and beyond putting the others under pressure after the Christmas excesses. Onwards through Shere, Ewhurst and back through Capel, Dorking, Leatherhead and back in Epsom at 12.40. 50m - 16.8mph

Join us next week Epsom, Spread Eagle (Leicester Bowden) - 9.30am, depart at 9.45. Pace and stop to suit those out. Hope to see you then!

Colin

Tuesday 12 January 2010

Well Done Trevor

Happy new year , nice supprise to get a blog option

Lets hope we all support Trevor's efforts and use the blog

Alan Fitchett flies the flag and meets hero of yester-year

“Bikes are immaterial,” says former Tour de France rider Vin Denson. “It’s the legs that matter.”

Speaking to an audience of cyclists on Saturday at Leigh, Surrey, the strongman who rode for Jacques Anquetil for several year said: “All the bikes are the same. If you made it onto a Tour de France team you’d get lots of bikes offered.”

Turning to the group of youngsters in the audience he advised: “You have to have ambition and not just for the next year – you should make out a four- or five-year programme and then work to it.

“I was inspired as a youngster by photos of stars riding over mountain passes in two metres of snow in their national jerseys and seeing them I decided I wanted to do that.

“We didn’t have coaches in those days, I certainly never had one, so you would go with the strong riders, copy what they did, ask questions and hang on their wheels.

“I was once in a race with Brian Robinson, the first rider to win a stage in the Tour de France. He was about 24 then and experienced, while I was just 18 and I must have annoyed him because I was asking questions endlessly.

“Brian and Shay Elliott were in the Tour de France when I did it the first time and I rode by copying them. We finished in the front 20 which was good, but most important for me was that I was learning all the time.”

Vin lengthy professional career was remarkably crash-free, though he did suffer from two memorable tumbles.

The second was a result of being on the wheel of smaller rider on a descent.

“Anquetil was a great tactician and he had some of everything on this team – rouleurs, climbers and sprinters. Our roulers were so imposing that the others often called our Ford France team the ‘equipe de rugby men’.

“Anyway one day we were in a group on a major descent and we were all roulers in this group apart from Jean Stablinski who was a little guy.

[Stablinski won the Vuelta in 1958 and was world champion in 1962. He was on the same team as Vin at the time]

“I had drawn the short straw and was on Stab’s wheel on this particular corner. He didn’t have to brake hardly because he was so light, so I was hanging back at about 4m from him when this car came through and gently eased me right off the road.

“The next thing I knew I was looking up two skirts… and when I looked some more I saw they had knobbly knees… they were two monks!

“Anyway they quickly took the cords from their robes and said to ‘tie the bike’ on and while the mechanic was putting me fresh wheels in the bike, they then set too and pulled me out. I was lucky.”

Vin afterwards agreed to take questions from each of the Redhill Raiders (aged 7-10) who sat in the audience.

What would be the one word that you think best describes your career?

V: Successful

Who was/is the best Tour de France rider?

V: Eddy Merckx…. and I say that even though I rode with Anquetil against him. But Merckx was incredible because he could just ride away from the entire field.

I remember we were the Tour of Sardinia, a stage race, and one day he rode off and won by three minutes.

Anquetil and all the other big names had their noses put out by this little-known newcomer and they put their heads together before the next day’s stage and agreed that ‘the upstart’ wouldn’t do that again.

So they went tearing after him whenever he moved, but even so with 4km to the finish line he accelerated on his own and we couldn’t catch him…. he won that day with a gap of 30 seconds.

What was your best moment?

V: Winning the Tour of Luxembourg. Before the start, three of us were given permission by the team to look to win.

After the time-trial stage a team-mate was lying fourth and I was eight, just 30 seconds behind him.

There were attacks from strong riders everywhere in the next day’s stage and when one attack went it took me up the road as well.

Eventually I said to the team manager “I’ve ridden myself inside out today to defend our best-placed rider but this break now has a gap of 2min 30sec on the bunch and I want to attack at get away on my own.”

Her said: “If you can make a clean break then go.”

I did just that.

There is no greater feeling…. you feel like two men when you’ve got the yellow jersey on your back.
clever trevor!

Monday 11 January 2010

Hi everyone, welcome to the Festival RC blog page. Hopefully, many of the club will register and contribute their thoughts or comments on a regular basis - more regularly than I updated the website at any rate!
As this is the first entry and a bit of a test - I've added a great picture of Colin Mc from the ride out to the Xmas lunch. Bizarrely, the weather hasn't really changed much in a whole month!

Happy New Year to all.