Willesden Cycling Club

Message from Melita Luxton of Audax UK regarding Simon Doughty’s present condition.

Dear All

I visited Simon yesterday and can report that there has been someimprovement in his condition.In the last week he has shown some awareness of his environment and isresponding to outside stimuli. His eyes are now fully open and he isfollowing movement around him. However, he is unfocussed and appears tobefollowing movement rather than individuals, unless the individual isdirectly talking to him. (NB Simon does not at this moment in time have hisglasses which may account for some of the lack of focus, though not all).

He can respond to exceptionally simple commands (eg ‘let go of my hand’) thoughnot yet communicate significantly. He is making his pain and distress clear when being handled (eg moving his hands when being suctioned via his trachesotomy or having physiotherapy). These are very positive signs, though Simon is still far from recovering significant neurological functioning – he can only respond, not initiate. Although slight, these signs are however, a major step forward from the unconsciousness that he was experiencing two weeks ago.

However, at this time, in spite of his progress, it is still far too early to gauge how much of a recovery Simon will make in the long term. Simon will undergo further surgery today to remove the pins and plates in his hips, those in his femur and ankle will be taken out at a later date. This will allow more intensive physiotherapy. Simon still has a tracheostomy inplace, though is no longer on oxygen. It is likely he will be moved fairly soon back to Sheffield (details when known).

I understand that one of the passengers in the stolen vehicle has been arrested. The family are awaiting a decision from the Crown Prosecution Service as to the final charges that are to be brought against the driver of the vehicle who remains in custody.

Janet and his family have again expressed their thanks for the many messagesyou are continuing to send. As ever, further updates as I get them.

Melita Luxton

The highlight of the Willesden calendar is on Sunday morning, the Famous Fry-Athalon!

The first element is the full fried breakfast. During the eagerly contested event, points are awarded for the amount of fried eggs, sausages and beans consumed. Remember calories = points. This is followed by the Hill climb and then the Freewheels contest.

Meet at Tescos Amersham at 10am, Sunday 3rd December.

The Willesden CC held our annual Track Championships at the Calshott track earlier this month. The events included a

– flying Two laps, from which the riders were seeded for the sprints,

– a 70 lap scratch race

– and a 100 lap points event.

Points were awarded for each event and the results were as follows

• Club Veterans Champion – Keith Wilmot
• Senior Champion – Roger Woodford
• Schoolpersons Champion (Girls) – Stephanie May
• Schoolpersons (Boys) – Michael Wilmot.

Well done to all them.

The latest report we have received on Simon’s condition is as follows –

“Dear All

It is now 3 weeks since Simons trauma. He has now been transferred to the high dependency unit at Manchester RoyalInfirmary from intensive care. At this time, he continues to be unresponsive to external stimuli and pain. Although generally unconscious, he has yawn and eye opening reflexes, though there is no sign of other activity.

The best case scenario for Simon is for him to regain consciousness and suffer only moderate brain impairment. The worst case scenario is that he remains in his current condition. Sadly, the longer he remains unresponsive, the less likely he is to recover. All that can be done at the moment is to wait, hope and pray.

Simon has undergone a surgical procedure to have a feeding tube inserted intohis stomach so that he can be given nutritional support. His orthopaedic and soft tissue injuries continue to heal well.

As ever, I will update as soon as I have any further information.

Regards–Melita Luxton”

Wendy and Jim Mears “made it legal” last Saturday and what a splendid day it was. Following the wedding ceremony the Willesden CC formed an arch of wheels for the happy couple.

Shortly afterwards we all retired to a wonderful country pub for a superb wedding breakfast. Jim and Wendy declined to join other Willesden riders who were taking part in a 200km audax starting at 4:30am the following morning. Can’t think why!

As many of you are probably aware, Simon Doughty was involved in a terrible accident on Thursday morning. He was involved in a hit and run accident with a stolen car during his cycle commute to work in Manchester.

He is presently unconscious and on a life support system. He condition is described as critical. We came very close to loosing our coach and club mate on Friday, but his condition seems to have improved slightly on Sunday.

From reports we have had Simon took the full blow on his chest, which is causing most concern to the medical team. In addition he also has a broken femur, pelvis and ankle.

I hope we will get more encouraging news soon.

John Davies

You get can’t too much of a good thing! That also applies to Willesden CC Club, so starting this week there will be two club nights each week.

As well as our regular Tuesday night Turbo sessions at the Wembley HQ, we will also be holding regular club nights on Thursday nights at Hillingdon Cycle Circuit. The circuit will be flung open to riders and non-riders from approximately 5.30 until 8 PM.

Refreshments served from 6.30 until 7.30 PM.

The charge is £2 for adults and £1 for youths inclusive of hot drink and cakes/biscuits.

If you are intending to ride please make sure that you have adequate front and rear lights.

Six Reliability Rides 28th January to 4th March 2007

The ‘Chiltern Classics’ Reliability Rides returns for 2007. Six great events with a different circuit each week different hills – different scenery.All Reliability Rides have time bands to suit your paceCertificates awarded to riders completing within their selected time band.

Sunday 28th January
Harp RC 100km & 50km (start 9 am)
HQ – Hemel Hempstead CC Clubroom

This first reliability trial of the series is the well-known Harp Hilly Hundred starting and finishing also at the Hemel Hempstead CC clubroom, for location map go to www.hemelcycling.org.uk. This starts off following a similar route as the Hemel event through to Chesham then it takes on its own character taking on the hilly bits of the northern Chilterns through Berkhamsted, Whipsnade (the infamous Bison Hill) then onto Aston Hill near Halton and tracking back through Tring, Ivinghoe Beacon, Whelpley Hill via White Hill to the clubroom for a well earned rest.

Sunday 4th February
Team Quest 100km (start 9 am)
HQ – Ickenham Guide Hut

The start and finish is from the Ickenham Guide Hut in Community Close in Ickenham and the route travels out towards High Wycombe; Paul Doel at The Bike Shop, North Harrow can explain.

Sunday 11th February
Hemel Hempstead CC 100km & 50km (start 9 am)
HQ – Hemel Hempstead CC Clubroom

This third reliability trial of the series starts and finishes at the HHCC clubhouse in Nash Mills Lane, near Kings Langley, Hemel Hempstead, for location map see www.hemelcycling.org.uk. The route travels out through Chesham, Wendover and Chinnor returning through Speen, Gt. Missenden, Chesham, Kings Langley and back to the club house with refreshments. It is a hilly circuit climbing some of the well-known Chiltern Hills of Chinnor and the notorious 1 in 4, Small Dean Lane, a killer but mercifully short and we provide refreshments at the top; also Frith Hill is included in the route. The 50 km route option turns short of Wendover returning through Chesham.

Sunday 18th February
Edgware RC 100km & 50km (start 9 am)
HQ – Denham Country Park

A slight relief from the previous hilly weeks as you will be delighted with this attractive undulating route. This event starts at the Denham Country Club and travels out to the Thames valley and at Marlow goes south on a fast flattish section through Windsor returning to Denham.

Sunday 25th February
Willesden CC 100km & 60km (start 9.30 am)
HQ – Ickenham Guide Hut
For details contact Ray Kelly

Starts at the Ickenham Guide Hut and travels out to Bledlow Ridge & Cryers Hill.

Sunday 4th March
CC Luton 100km & 40miles (start 9.30 am)
HQ – Edlesborough Village Hall

This is the sixth and last event of the Chiltern Classics Reliability Rides for 2007. The route commences from the village hall in Edlesborough and travels through Slapton, Wing, Stewkley and out to Swanbourne (tea room open) where the route turns to meander through the attractive Buckinghamshire lanes past Cublington, Wingrave, Marsworth and onto Aldbury up the infamous but thankfully short ‘Toms Hill’ and onto Nettleden towards Redbourn where the route turns again through some hilly bits to Flamstead, Studham, Gaddesden Row, Dagnell and back home to Edlesborough. The 40 miler is available and includes good ole Tom’s Hill; the route is 95% country lanes.

Gill and Suzz meet up with some Irish cyclist ………….

(Thanks to Glad for sending the photo)

30 Sep/01 October Results

In the London and Home Counties Vets 25 at Maidenhead Richard Jerome recorded a 1.03 35 in difficult conditions as the event was run in wet conditions and parts of the road were extremely damp after the heavy rain. One third of the field did not start and several did not finish as they punctured on the gritty roads.

Meurig Rode the Welsh Hillclimb championships on 2nd October. Unfortunately he messed up his pacing and rode too easy!! Still came in 4th though.

8/9 October Results

Gill Reynolds was the fastest lady in the Cambridge C.C. 10 mile event over a hilly course returning in 27.44. Also on Sunday two of the club’s youngest life members- Jacqueline Harris and Susan Doel ran in the Nike 10km event at Hyde Park rubbing shoulders with pregnant Paula Radcliffe. Before Jacqueline and Susan were married they were known as the Purdy twins-Proud Mum speaking!

15/16 October Results

The annual interclub 2 Up 10 mile with the Westerley took place at Gt.Missenden over the weekend. The fastest pair were Dave Newman and Malcolm Woolsey of the Westerley R.C. with a time of 22.50. The next 6 places were filled by Willesden members-father and son team Roger And Tony Woodford did 25.50, whilst father and daughter team Chris James and Jayne Payne managed a 26.40. David Walters and Surendra Patel 26.47,Ron Johnson and Rob Ross 29.23, Brian Wright and Hilary Pandya 29.47 and Mike Ellison and Ray Kelly 29.54. Second claim members Maria Docker and Keith Elliot also took part and finished in 30.39.

The Westerley also held their hillclimb at Longdown Hill near Princes Risborough and Willesden members took part. Steven Ayres finished in 3rd spot in 2mins52secs and Darlene Rini from the U.S. who rides with the Willesden on clubruns 3mins21secs. Mike Ellison, no doubt tired from his efforts in the 10 mile time trial recorded 4.14.

Gill Reynolds traveled to the New Forest to ride in the New ForestC.C. 10 and recorded 26.54.
Less fortunate was Richard Jerome who punctured in the Hillingdon 25 at Marlow whilst his Dad Mike rode his first event for several years and finished in 1.16.33.

• Provisional Program (subject to change depending on numbers).
• Flying 2 Lap TT
• 100 Lap Points (Sprints every 20 laps)
• Sprint (seeded from TT)
• 10 Km Scratch

The Event will be run as an omnium with the leading first claim Willesden rider winning the Club Track trophy. The event is open to all 1st and 2nd claim members as well as special guest stars.

Sorry, No EOLs.

Contact Roger Woodford on

roger@woodford2k.plus.com

The club’s Audax section were in action making preparations for next year’s Paris -Brest-Paris.

Liz Creese organized the “Autumn Assortment”, three rides of 200km, 100km and a 50km starting from Ruislip. One of the club’s newest members 16 year old David Hinton rode the 200 km as did Hilary Pandya and Danny Fisher- all not detered by the very wet start. In the 100 km Ian Oliver and his son Pieter ,Steve Maslin and son David, Annie Birch and Martin O’Connor took part. The 50km ride was started in better conditions and ridden by by Mike Ellison,Mick Hill,Diplak Pandya, Rocco Richardson and John Tipping.

The Racing season is practically over so there are very few events to come .Meurig James rode in the North Hampshire R.C. on Saturday and took 2nd place with a personal best time of 54.33 whilst Gill Reynolds on Sunday defied the floods and finished in 2nd place in the Hounslow and District Wheelers 25 at Aldermarston with a 1.06.11. Meurig rode on Sunday in the Surrey League Road Race at Cutmill and finished in 14th place.

Cheers for now, Gladys

Every Tuesday from the 17th October the environs of Wembley will echo to a rock /techno beat, rasping lungs and Kelly’s “Acme Thunderer”!

That’s right, Turbo Torture Tuesday (or T3) is back for another winter of discomfort. At an amazing price of £2 for an hour (it will feel like a week), you can maintain your hard worked for 2006 fitness through to the 2007 season.

Under superior coaching skills of Ray Kelly, you will be put through a careful and varied programme of exercises. As well as pain and gain, the Turbo sessions will be liberally sprinkled with the famous Kelly wit and his careful selection of music to turbo by.

Turbo Torture Tuesday is held every Tuesday night from 17th October at the Willesden CC’s global head quarters in London Road, Wembley. (See “Directions“ at the bottom of this posting).

Doors open at 7:30pm for set-up and warm-up. Turbo Coaching starts promptly at 8:00pm

Your need to bring

• Turbo trainer
• Bike
• £2
• Towel
• Water bottle
• Sense of humour
• Change of Clothing

Drinks and cake available afterwards in the Kitchen.

See you there….Kelly is waiting for you !!!!!

Directions
The Willesden Club room is in the Pavilion in the Palying Fields at the end of London Road Wembley. See following link for detailed map

http://tinyurl.co.uk/np75

Last weekend (16/17 September) was a busy one for the Squadra Verde.

WCC Road Race
Highlight of the weekend was the Willesden Road race for the John and Dulcie Walker Trophies. A mass pile up at the first bend was avoided by advertising start times from 1.00pm, 1:30pm 2:00pm, 2:45pm and 3:45pm! Most riders seem to plump for the third start time. WCC glamour gal, Jayne P., arrived late by was allowed to join in with around 30 laps to go. Richard Jerome was the only other rider flying the Willesden colours in our annual event.

Results were as follows –

E/1/2/3
1, Colin Roshier, Tm Quest, 1h 24m 34s
2, Roy Chamberlain, Tm Milton Keynes at st
3, Alex Breary, PCA/Ciclos Uno at 28s

3rd Cat prizes:
1, B Ford.
2, S Baker.
3, D Kenneway.

4/W/J
1, George Georgiev, PM
2, Oliver Newton, Twickenham CC/Evans Cycles
3, Alec Huckin, Didcot Phoenix CC
Thank you to Brian Wright for organising the race at the last minute

Time Trial
Jayne and Jumbo were in action on Sunday on the WLC 2up on the Amersham Road. They did a very respectable 1:06:08 for their first TT together. WCC’s Miles Back has heard that the two J’s were eagerly discussing tactics, skulldugery and sabotage over a monster fry up in the Deep Mill Dinner afterwards.

Our man Meurig James was feeling unwell last week so only managed two PBs and a fifth place this weekend. He posted a 20:42 on Saturday on the Andover Wheeler’s 10 and on Sunday at the Kent VTTA 50 – 1:58:16 (5th fastest)

We hope you recover soon Meurig!!

Sean Bannister (without his Derny!) is having a great time at the World Masters at Manchester this week.

In the Mens Pursuit (60–64 age group) Sean took the Silver medal with a time of 2.36.748 minutes.The Gold medal was won by Denis Fahey of Australia when he finished the Pursuit in 2.30.495 minutes. The Bronze medal was won by Michael Allen of Great Britain when he narrowly beat Jukka Oksanen of Finland in 2.37.491 minutes.

In the Bush Healthcare non-championship event for over 60 years, Sean representing Great Britain made a decisive break with 5 laps to go to win this 5km scratch race. Manfred Nepp of Germany and Keith Harrison of U.S.A. lead the pack to finish second and third respectively.

Sounds like he’ll have to surender his bus pass now!

The Johny and Dulcie Walker Road races will be contested at Hillingdon at 1:00pm on Saturday 16th September 2006.

Please come along and support your event and wear plenty of green

The last meeting of Welwyn Track league took place on Friday.

Roger Woodford was Racing for the Willesden CC. In the 10 lap Scratch Roger was boxed in until 200M to go but still managed to get 3rd place. In the 10 mile the the pace was constantly high throughout. This discouraging any significant breakaways forming but many were losing contact unable to keep up the high tempo. Roger won 2 of the bonus sprints for some extra prize money.

Then with just 2 laps to go Johnny Torrez attacked the bunch and quickly gained ground. With 1 lap left John McClelland sensed it was now or never and started his long sprint for home. As soon as John came past Roger kicked for home as well and it was a drag race to the finish.

McClelland caught Torrez on the line to win. With Roger closing very fast on them both but finishing third. It has been Rogers most successful year at Welwyn Track League and he finished 6th overall in the “A” League.

This Friday Roger will be racing at the World Masters Track championships, details of which can be found at http://www.cyclingmasters.com/ . This is the world championship for the over 30’s. With a Bronze in the National Championship this year. Roger is hoping for another medal winning performance.

Reigning west London Sprint champion Dave Dentus will defending his title at Palmer Park this week. With Roger entered as well hopefully it will be an all Willesden Final!

Looking for events organised by the Willesden CC, then click on the “WCC Event planner” on the right hand side of the Screen, under “Links”.

This will show you all the Audax, Road racing and Time Trials that we are helping to organise, as well as details on the Club runs, various social outings on the club’s monthly meeting.

John Davies

In preparation for next year’s Paris-Brest I had an idea that we should run a night time 200km Audax. This would give those new to the event some night riding experience, before the qualifying rides begin next year. As there were no such events on the Audax calendar we had to draw upon an Audax Permanent to provide the solution. Mark Brooking suggested using the “Midlands Mesh” 200km route and offered his home as both start and finish points.

On Saturday 2nd September, six of us met up at Mark’s home on a very windy Saturday afternoon. They were Wendy Earl, Hilary Pandya, Jim Mears, Lynn Francoli, Mark Brooking and myself.

I had taken the train up to Waltham Cross. The short ride from the station to Mark’s house was ominously blustery. Small branches were lying in the road and trees were angrily thrashing their arms at the wind, as indeed was I. The thought of cancelling the ride began to cross my mind, as conditions could prove dangerous if the wind were to further increase. Fortunately it proved to be a bit a last ditch squall and conditions settled down to merely breezy as we set off at 7pm.

“Loose chippings on the Road” said the sign and for the next few miles we ploughed along a scree slope passing itself off as a road. The already difficult riding conditions further hampered by darkness and the dust thrown up by cars, which swirled around in our lights. The night time newbies must have wondered what they had let themselves in for. Rather ironically the chipping ceased when we arrived at Chipping Ongar. On the positive side the wind was now behind us and we were wafted towards Saffron Walden was at a brisk but comfortable pace. I imagine this is how cycling must be if you are really fit and strong.

We got to the “turn” at Newmarket at about 1.00am where we were the object of much comment from the local youth tottering out of their watering holes. We entertained a few of the more curious revellers who asked what we doing and where we were going. They wished us well in a genuine but rather slurred manner.

By the time we set off for the return journey to London the wind had dropped and conditions were getting balmy. Showers began to appear near dawn, punctuating the ride with stops to “cape up” and then a few minutes later to “cape off“. Also a stop at Bonks Hill was digitaly recorded!

We arrived back at Mark’s house around 8am Sunday morning, with about 15 minutes to spare on time. Alison immediately produced a wonderful fried breakfast which went down a treat

Wendy, Jim and Hilary were new to night riding and seemed to enjoy the full Audax experience. I often heard them chattering and laughing as our little groupetto steadily progressed through the dark. They are now distressingly keen to repeat the exercise on a 300km ride in October. Their appetites whetted by the possibility of going for the Audax Round-the-year award.

A big thank you to

• Mark for organising the route
• To Alison for the catering, the best on the route!
• To Frankie for childminding.
• To Wendy, Jim, Hilary, Lynn and Mark for their excellent company

In the afternoon I went down to watch the ToB on the Mall. For some reason I fell asleep on the bus on the way home to Willesden!

John Davies