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@Brain-Stew
Surrey League 4-up TTT yesterday.
The traffic was so appalling that we arrived the race 30 minutes before our start time, and in the ensuring faff had no time to warm up, look at the course, or generally prepare for an event that none of us had ridden before.
A quick look at the opposition gave us a good indication that we were a little out of our depth - no TT bikes between our two teams, and 6/8 had hairy legs. Quite the contrast to the majority with slippery-fast race machines, pointy helmets, and serious faces. Still we'd paid our monies so without further ado set off to give the 34-mile rolling course a good licking.
About 7 miles into the first lap, one of our riders (who had the most bling kit) managed to hit an enormous pothole which was hidden in the dappled shade, and flatted his deep-section front wheel with a bang. After that, there was nothing for it but to give it some serious welly.
TTTs are a really interesting way to race. You're only as fast as your slowest person, so the team aspect really comes in to keeping up the momentum, watching your pace up hills and around corners, and communicating all of the time so that everyone's on the same page.
We were very happy not to be caught by the team behind us (the Cat 1 and 2 Windymilla squad), and even did our fair share of overhauling a couple of other teams. We had noticed a lot of puncture casualties on the road, and even taking into account the appalling state of Surrey's roads, it seemed like more than expected for the race. Reports back at the HQ were that thumb tacks had been found on the road and in tyres. Great to know how it feels to ride the Tour...
Didn't stick around for the results (the TT crowd seem to have a fairly niche conversation bracket, and the canteen had run out of fizzy pop and cake) so we hot footed it back to London, taking a mere 2.5 hours to cover the 35 miles home. Probably should have ridden...
[ame]http://connect.garmin.com/activity/220770790[/ame]