May Racing

Its pretty much core race season in Scotland at the moment.  Classic Scottish road races, one after the other throughout late April, May and into June.  Pretty grueling on the legs, and also requiring a fairly sympathetic family if you intend to ride every weekend.

Looking back at the races complete I'm pretty happy with most of the results I've had.  Aside from Giford where I DNF I had a good string of strong finishes in the early season races.  The Duncan McGregor RR, and Sam Robinson RR yesterday were both really tough and I felt although I rode to reasonable results I had to really battle to get there, and maybe hoped to have done slightly better.  In the Duncan McGregor RR I was unlucky to puncture, but had been working hard even before that.  The Sam Robinson RR yesterday was considerably tougher than the previous year.  The extra lap of the finishing circuit is a real killer, as it adds a lot of climbing and several more miles at a time when most folk are already near their limit.  When I rode it last year I did well, luck was on my side, and finished 2nd behind Evan.  This year I think the overall competition was perhaps stronger, the course and weather harder and I suffered toward the end to finish 6th.

Coming back from the finish at the Sam I took the opportunity to do a lap of the course that will be used for the Scottish Road Race Championships this Sunday.  The course is an 11Km circuit at Balfron which we'll complete 12 times.  Although the circuit doesnt have a big climb on it, the cummulative miles and undulations are going to make it a very hard race.  It will no doubt be super fast at the start, and with a lot of corners I expect there will be a lot of sprinting just to hang onto wheels early in the race never mind trying to get into a break.  To make it harder it seems like the two main uphill sections on the circuit will be up wind.  This will make it harder to break, as riders behind will get a drafting advantage making it easier to close on the riders infront.

The finish is particularly brutal.  There is a fast downhill, pothole covered section, before a 90degree right hand turn onto Balfron highstreet.  The finish is then about 200-300 metres up an increasingly steep hill.  By the finish I'm pretty sure the race will be in bits anyway, but that last kick to the line will be horrible.  Riding it after doing yesterdays race gave a good indication of how my legs might feel - not good!  At the last 2 races James and Ben from Rapha have been the 2 men to watch, however neither are riding on Sunday.  They'll be replaced by other strong riders though, for example Evan Oliphant (Endura) and Michael Nicholson is returning from Belgium to race.  Based on my current form I think a top 10 is achieveable, the closer to the top the better.

After that I've got the Scottish 10mile TT champs to look forward to the weekend after, and then the next Super6 in Ayrshire the weekend after that.... exhausting!