On Sunday Ron Purdy took part in the Hatch End/Harrow Triathlon and for the second year running won the age award for 80-84 years old. He swam 400 metres, cycled 17Km and ran 3Km. He was suffering from a painful right arm during the week but still took part as he was being sponsored by friends to raise money for St Luke’s Hospice.
On Saturday Kirsten Savage and Connor Woodford rode the first round of the National Omnium Series at Welwyn.
Kirsten was 14th in the Scratch race, 14th in the Devil, 7th in the points, 10th in the sprint, and 9th in the TT finishing 10th overall in the under 16 girls category.
Connor was 12th in the scratch, 13th in the Devil, 12th in the points, 11th in the sprint and 11th in the TT finishing 12th overall in the under 14 boys Category.
Friday 11th May Connor Woodford rode at Welwyn (Under 14’s) and was placed 3rd in the 5 lap scratch, 3rd in the Devil, 3rd in the Points race and won the 4 lap handicap race catching all those in front and winning on his own.
A Willesden Audax, the Ditchling Devil, is on June 10th this year.
LOCOG bagged our weekend from last year to open the Olympics(!) so it’s relocated to June 10.
The Ditchling Devil is a 200km round trip from London to the Brighton via Ditchling Beacon and The Devils Dyke, organised by Paul Stewart. We start outside the Windmill Tearooms, Wimbledon Common between 7-8am and finish in Richmond Park at the Roehampton Gate Café with refreshment controls Ardingly (50km) and Upper Beeding (110km) and Chiddingfold (150km). This is a great route through rolling countryside with the odd bump over the Downs.
If you haven’t ridden an Audax event before – the Ditchling Devil is a sort of organized ‘day tour’. We provide a detailed routesheet and GPX track for those with GPS, and controls & refreshment points round the route. It’s definitely not a race though there is an overall time limit around of around 13.5 hours for an accredited finish for those that want (Paul has a home to go to!). Most get round in 10~12 hours overall but if you want to stop off at Brighton, wherever, that’s fine too. Having a great day out is the name of the game.
Here are a couple (okay lots!) of photos from the recent washed out, cold, windy, hilly (and yet somehow fantastic) Isle of Wight Randonee. I’m sure there will be more photos to come.
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A word of warning for anyone using the Hog Hill circuit about security. You may or not be aware that there have been a number of bike thefts recently so people have taken to locking up their bikes when not racing. Well it seems that a small ‘deterrent’ lock isn’t sufficient, make sure you take a hefty lock with you and use it.
Here’s a plea for info regarding the latest theft….
Not from our club but the theft of a bike from Hog Hill should alert us all. Pictures of the thief stolenbikethief.pdfand the bike stolenbikeposter.pdfare linked too. See the message below from Steve Jensen: Hi everyone, My son Georg had his bike stolen from Hog Hill yesterday after the youth race today. The bike was locked up, but the thief cut the lock and made off. Luckily it was all filmed and one of our club members photographed the assailant. I’ve attached information about his bike (which he saved for and built himself) and the mug shot of the mug who took it! The car number plate is from Sidcup. If anyone hears or sees anything about this please let me know. Not so much fun up at Hog Hill these day! If you can forward this to any club members or friends of cycling who might appreciate the information, or who might help Georg. Please contact me on 07810333722 or LVYCC Bob Griffiths (Club Secretary) on 01708 550738. Thanks a lot. Regards Steve Jensen
Jenny has now given me the details of arrangements regarding donations which are as follows:- Anyone wishing to make a donation can do so by writing a cheque payable to British Cycling and sending it to-
Brian Wright Donation, Finance Department, British Cycling, National Cycling Centre, Stuart Street, Manchester, M11 4DQ
Alternatively, individuals can telephone British Cycling’s Finance Department on 0161 2742050 and make a donation by credit or debit card.
Once collected, the donations will be divided equally between the main cycling groups which Brian supported to enable them to do something in his memory.
The European Duathlon Championships were held in Horst, Holland on 29th April and the races were divided into 5 year age groups. Ray Tucker, a member of Willesden Cycling Club, was selected to compete for Great Britain in the 70 – 75 year team.
Ray was in the silver medal position after the running phase behind a Dutchman but was caught on the cycle phase by a Belgian and Frenchman so got pushed into finishing in 4th place. Britain sent a team of 67 athletes and came back with 10 gold, 5 silver and 4 bronze.
[Thanks to Ian Why for forwarding the information]
The funeral will take place on Tuesday,15th May at 3.15p.m. at the Amersham Crematorium. A floral tribute will be sent from the club but Jenny has asked that others send donations to a fund which is being set up in Brian’s memory. Further details to follow.
Some 30 riders turned out in very wet and windy conditions this morning to ride a club run following the untimely death this week of Brian Wright, WCC Chairman. The club rode out to Wendover Woods only to find that the 364 days a year cafe was closed – exceptionally stormy weather had brought trees down and blocked the entrance roads.
The club rode on to the Worlds End Garden Centre for much needed hot drinks, where we were joined by several riders from the Westerley CC.
Earlier many more members and friends had seen the club run off at Denham.
Brian Wright – husband, father grandfather, cyclist, club mate, chairman, engineer, coach, motivator, Tool Maker, organiser, manager, motivator, bike mechanic, fixer, doer, shaper, fighter, leader, positive thinker and fan of all females is with us no more. He leaves a hole in each of our lives. Thank you Brian for all you have done for the Willesden and for each of us in it. May the wind be under your wheels forever.
Jenny has asked me to let you all know that Brian died last night,(April 25th) in Majorca. He was at a training camp with Don Mason. Full details will be available later. I am sure that we all extend our deepest sympathy to Jenny and family as he will be sadly missed by so many in the cycling fraternity.
We have hired Welwyn track on the 26th May. Club members £5.00 and non members £10.00. Bike hire is available £3.00. All levels welcome including novices who have never riden on the track before as we have coaches available. Please arrive at 1.30 as we need to be on the track for 2.00.
A soggy ride west to Hillingdon wasn’t filling me full of enthusiasm for the opening round of the Wednesday night vets series. Luckily the weather cleared and we were rewarded with a grey and windy evening, perfect for us grumbling old codgers.
A lot of the fast boys were off getting faster in Majorca so it was left to a lone Dynamo rider to take off straight from the gun, holding out till halfway. The pace was swift and steady, nobody really willing to put in too much effort. I even put in a bit of a dig and got away for a short while, the bunch engines towing the group up to me rather than jumping across.
The women’s race is now a much bigger affair and consequently much faster, we’d normally pass them twice during the race but this time we only passed them once, two laps from the end of their race. Brilliant. Cue lots of unladylike language as they came past us again to wind up for the sprint. Our race was effectively neutralized for a lap but I don’t think anyone cared. Three to go and things got a bit more interesting, the usual cut and thrust of a Hillingdon sprint. I was a bit far back but managed to get some space for a clean sprint and rolled in for 10th in age category. To be honest I’d forgotten about the age band thing and had backed off with 50m to go thinking I’d missed the points. Doh!
That put me on top of the Willesden men’s BC Ranking. But not for long…..
As John Williams and I were racing the Thames Velo Road Race the day after. It would have been sensible to conserve the legs where possible and save them for the following day. I’m not sure if it was the caffeine gel but I was in quite a confident mood on Saturday and the legs felt OK.
The race didn’t feel very fast, there were quite a few junior riders taking part who I assumed had raced earlier in the morning and were just using this race as training. I thought it might be a good move to try and split the race up a bit but not to try too hard as I really needed to save the legs for the big road race the next day.
With 22 laps to go I found myself on my ahead of the bunch with a decent gap but I just kept finding that rather than work with me, riders were just creeping back up to me and sitting on my wheel. I quickly realised I needed to stop wasting energy and just try and make sure I didn’t miss any decent breaks.
A group of 4 riders did get away for probably around 5 laps and I was a bit annoyed with myself for messing it up but I was patient and the break did come back and I’m pretty sure I didn’t have to do much work to bring it back.
As the race came to a close the bunch really started to slow and the riding was a bit dodgy to say the least. I didn’t really fancy the idea of a bunch sprint so I was on the look out for a last ditch attempt to get in a break. I followed a wheel but ended up going off on my own again with 4 laps to go, another group formed behind me and had got away from the bunch and were working well together. I decided to sit up and wait for them in the hope that we would work together and stay away.
As it was so close to the finish, the riders didn’t seem to want to do a turn on the front and the move failed, this put me in a bit of a bad mood which then made me more determined to have a go at the sprint.
It’s quite hard to describe everything that happened as it all happened so quickly but it was really, really dodgy and I do remember taking no prisoners on the last lap to make sure I was up there. With two corners to go I was on the inside of the circuit and I thought I’d lost out as most of the bunch hurtled down the outside of me into the corner but there was a lot of wind on that corner and I had the most shortest distance to cover so by the time we came to the finishing straight I was near the front. I think I did get blocked a little bit on the last corner as a rider moved across me but I did OK in the sprint and finished 8th.
I still need to work out how to get myself right in the front of the race for these sprint finishes so I can start to contest for the wins, hopefully that will start to happen as I get a bit fitter.
There is also a video on youtube (below), notice John Williams sitting up and having a nice chat with one lap to go. Needless to say he’d decided to save his legs for the road race the next day.
On Sunday Ron Purdy took part in the Hatch End/Harrow Triathlon and for the second year running won the age award for 80-84 years old. He swam 400 metres, cycled 17Km and ran 3Km. He was suffering from a painful right arm during the week but still took part as he was being sponsored by friends to raise money for St Luke’s Hospice.
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