I had a great time at the track on thursday night, racing the Northcote CC regular races. It has been some time since I have had a win on Thursday- in fact I don't think I have won before in B grade. There were a couple of good solid wins in C grade prior to my promoting myself in early mid 2008, when I figured that if I was going to be doing the worlds, I had better at least be contesting B grade at club level. The problem is that as someone who sees themself as entirely devoid of sprint ( perhaps this is too much of a crutch, and allows me to excuse myself from the hurly burly at the end of many races), winning in B grade has been rather elusive, as the increased pace has made it harder to make a decent break that sticks to the end. I had a few reasonable results over the past months, with the odd 3rd and 4th, including at the Austral carnival.
Great satisfaction then, when last thursday I pulled a first in the Scratch race. The joy was helped by the general feeling of the evening, having Pete S, Graeme and Ben racing the same grade with me. Definite sense of cameraderie, with a feeling of possibility for the evening. I have recently been paying much more attention to who I start behind and thinking about the wheels I want to look out for during the race. There were lots of juniors, many of whose wheels, I did not want as while they are often fast sprinters, plenty are pretty unpredictable and tend to fade if there is a decent chase (to be fair they are running stupidly small gear limitations). Knowing P, G and B, I was happy to grab an of their wheels. Ended up on a Carnegie guy, with the others behind me. The wheels started turning and some of the guys up the front turned on the gas right at the start, which is a very un-B-grade move. A gaping hole opened between the 2 halves of the field, but at this stage, there were lots of sprinty young-uns, so it was just wait until the fields rejoined. I couple of further surges went ahead, but again with no really solid conteneders to worry about. Some were getting jittery wen Peter V went off, but I have yet to be convinced of his ability to stay. He did not disappoint. My Carnegie guy was out the back, and the field had reshuffled itdelf a couple of times, as I found myself rolling up towards the front as Pete S was holding the pace after the last of the surges. This seemed an approriate time to try on a breakaway, so I got out of the saddle and hammered it. The new bike certainly accelerates, and when I looked back, there was not a lot of action at the front of the field, no doubt aided by the fact that Peter was not going to chase me down in a hurry. I was surprised however that no-one else seemed keen to come over the top of him. I had about a quarter of a lap in no time, which was good, given that the lap counter showed 8 to go. A long way to go, but most people will expect you to come back to the field whatever you do, so probably a good time to go if you can make the distance. After a couple of laps at my maximum, I consciously pegged it back a bit to a hard but managable pace, constantly monitoring where the field was. Graeme took off out the front, and I wondered whether he was going to drag a couple up to me, but he eased off again, and I kept my margin going. The chase finally got going in the final 3 or 4 laps, but by this time, I was feeling like I could hold it, with a bit of recovery happening for the last couple of lap effort. As they were starting to pull me back to within a quarter of a lap, the time came and I had enough left to accelerate and finish with a pretty solid margin over the rest. It felt like a really good win, and it comes in good time. It really was seeming that getting a win was just impossible. I rode well, but credit where credit is due, Pete blocking gave me the opportunity to really gap the field at the start of the break. Definitely felt like a bit of a team effort.
The rest of the night ran along more standard lines. I fluffed winning the first sprint in the points race, after breaking from the field and slowing just a touch too much. More my usual style! Still, Graeme got the points, and ultimately took the race. I pulled some more minor points to come in 4th. Good fun though, pulling a bit of weight for the others. The motor-pace was somewhat more disappointing, with the group of us ending up at the back when the motorbike came off- one of the peculiarities of the race is that riders have to peel off one by one, each lap until the bike comes off with 2 1/2 laps to go. If you haven't counted right or if someone has squeezed into a gap, and you come to peel off with 7 or 8 laps to go, your race is pretty much over, as you are not allowed to move forward again until the motorbike comes off. We all made a bit of a tilt at getting toward the front, but it was just too far, with the front runners accelerating and others giving up as they ran out of pace, preventing our easy passage. Rolled in with the bunch.
A good night's racing.
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