Instead of going on the Great Brissie Bike ride I thought I'd punish myself and enter the Tenthill Classic. This is the first of the open road events in Qld, run by the Toowoomba Cycling Club. This is a very well organised event, over an mostly flat 25km course near Gatton with a few lumps and one reasonably steep hill - Caffeys climb. It's not a climbers circuit more a power riders course. I entered the CAT 3 race which was a combined field of Mens C,Masters B & Womens A (I'm masters 2). This was a massive field of 90 riders about half of whom were one day licences. Be afraid...be very afraid 🙂
This was my first real 'open' road race so I didn't really know what to expect, except that it would be hard. Cat 1 distance was 125km, Cat 2 100km, and Cat 3 & 4 75km.
Some of the roads were a little narrow and bumpy and with such a big field sometimes riding 4 abreast it was a little nerve wracking. Also if you got trapped on the left it was hard to move up. There was also some traffic coming the other way. I've been doing strength training and it's taken it out of me a bit and I nearly pulled out a couple of times. Second lap I felt better (not enough warm up?) and got up the Caffey climb in the lead - they had a 'carnival of the climb' and quite a few spectators so I probably got a bit carried away. I made sure I didn't snag my bars on a spectator's souvenir feedbag 🙂 Got in a small breakaway but riders kept dropping off and we were caught on the final straight.
After that effort I started cramping up so I just hid for a while. Last lap on the back straight leading up to the climb two riders got away. I tried to get the front group to work together to chase as I wanted to be up the front over the hill but noone wanted to do any work and I ended up doing too much myself again. Eventually someone further back powered past with riders in tow and chased them down before the climb.
Hit the climb and the cramping got really bad, and I decided to just cruise to the finish. I drifted back from the front till I was out the back. Then I thought 'bugger it' and chased up and over the top, got a wheel of a straggler and hammered it on the descent. We just managed to catch the back of the pack again. Looking like a bunch sprint finish, we entered the last five km - a slight uphill rise to the line and the pace really picked up with a couple of surges over 50kph. I moved up somewhere near the front. Someone went pretty early and it was on from a long way out. It got pretty dicey at the end 5 or 6 wide to the line and I was probably not aggressive enough but I just wanted to arrive with my skin intact. Didn't get a clear run and ended up around 12th place, checked the polar later and hit 59.8kph over the line. Not bad for a slight uphill finish!
I only caught the end of the 125km A grade race, it was very strung out on the last lap. Brendan Hill (Mondial) and Jaaron Poad (Velo) were out the front, with Brendan crossing the line first. Then a gap back to Nick Formosa (Velo) and then Adrian Booth (Healthworks) a fair way behind.
Heaps of fun and a great event but I'm paying for it now with legs of lead!
Adam