Evesham Vale Road Race

I have done this race for the last 2 years and was previously a catagory 2/3/4 race. The first year it was tipping with rain and i got dropped after half way. The second year i had a great race and managed 8th in the sprint. This year the race had been upgraded to E/1/2/3 classification and saw the turn out of pro team such as Dan Fleemans raleigh pro team, Orbead-Forgoodnessshakes and Willier RT. This was going to be a fast one and i had no idea what to expect.

This was made worse by the fact i had lost all confidence in my ability after a bad winter campain that lead to me chronically overtraining through silly volume, 4hr turbo session and hard cross racing. I had lost a lot of weight and had no energy to do anything let alone train. I had basically strated again only a few weeks ago so i was my expectations were low for this race.

After riding from home to the race, i got my numbers pinned, spare clothing dumped in ramdom peoples cars and met up with Tom Worvil from the team who was also racing. Thankfully today it was glorious sunshine and plesantly warm.
The race, as expected, was fast from the gun and on the first climb the attacks went and riders were already going off the back. I tried to ride as smart as i could as i had no idea how strong i would be against this caliber of rider. After a while of closing gaps and bridging up to the smaller groups, the race was still together and i was growing confidence, i even went with a few moves off the front.

Soon it got serious and the shapped up with a group of 4 off the front who would ultimatly stay away till the end, then there was anothet chase group of about 10 riders and then our group. There was avgroup behind us but they pulled out on the last lap. The race would finish in the order of those groups with the win been talen by raleigh no less. I tried to attack off the front of our group in the last mile with 4 other riders but we got dragged back in soon after. I reset my self for the sprint which was slightly up hill, i felt good and was in a good position as the sprint went. I moved out from behind the riders and overtook move thatn i could count to finish about 10th in our group.

I was pleased with this and had given me loads of confidence going forward. I am unsure of my overall position but will post it asap. It the Bill Jinks RR next week which is the first race counting towards the Midlands road league so look out for an update after next week end.

Bye for now