The Season Till Now...

Before I write anything about the last few months I thought I'd name drop horrible. After having met Jens Voigt in Criterium Cycles in March I was lucky enough to see him again in Mallorca so here's Jens and me. Also a selfie with Thor Hushovd! Anyway now I've got that out the way, on to my actual post...

 Since my last post life has been a bit of a daze. Between a week of training and 'studying' in Mallorca, my final days of school, choosing a university for next year, training, racing and perhaps most importantly the dreaded SQA exams, its been a busy few months

Perhaps my most exciting news since my last post is that I've been invited to ride for East Scotland at the Arctic Tour of Norway Heroes of Tomorrow race that is being held in Narvik (northern Norway). The race is taking place at the end of August and I am very much looking forward to my first experience of international racing.

My racing has really picked up since my last post. I have competed in 4 road race, 3 time trials, 2 crits and a track meet with mixed successes. The highlight of these recent races has to be the Sharon Argue Memorial Trophy which took place in Slamannan, Falkirk. The day was split into two races, a 5 mile rolling time trail in the morning and a 30 mile road race in the afternoon. The event was very well promoted and the result was a record number of women for a Scottish road race, ranging from beginners racing for the first time to commonwealth games riders and British level pros. The first rider
was off at 11.01 (which meant no 5am starts unlike the other time trials I've done this year) and as the sun shone it also felt like summer! Time Trialing equipment was allowed so I was kitted out with my clip on bars and an aero helmet, I felt a bit like I'd over done it as I rolled to the start as lot of the other women were just on standard road bike but then someone on a TT bike with a disc went passed so I stopped feeling bad! The TT course was like 3 sides of a square, the first side with a head wind and a few sharp ups, the second a long, straight, slightly down hill road and the third a undulating road with a tail wind. I got away from the start smoothly and caught both my minute and two-minute women and was feeling good, the only bad point was when I hit the tail wind section and due to junior gear restrictions was totally spinning out.

Doesn't look like much of a hill...

After a quick change out of my skin suit, some food and switching my bike back to standard road position (thank you to my dad for sorting that part for me!) I had a bit of time to relax before getting ready for the road race. The race was over 4 laps of a pretty challenging circuit with some narrow twisty turns, 2 longer drags half way round and 3 pretty short steep climbs within the last few kilometres including a nasty kick up the finishing straight.

I was nervous to see how I would cope as I've never been a particularly strong climber. So as we rolled out of the HQ I tried to hold a middle-ish position in the bunch so I had some positions to slip back on the hills. This plan worked on the first two hills but as we came round to the finishing hill for the first time I just lost contact with the back of the bunch.  Towards the top I was only a 100 metres or so behind when there was a touching of wheels in the bunch and a few riders hit the deck. This meant a few of them were chasing back on and I was able to join them.

We worked pretty well as a group and as we approached the last lap everyone was tiring until it was mainly me and a very nice lady from Moray Firth doing the work at the front. Coming up to the final hill and the sprint for positions there was some confusion on the road ahead as a rider from the front bunch had crashed and was still on the road, this in itself wasn't too much of an issue the real problem was the horse that was coming in the opposite direction and for some reason was on our side of the road.   The person on the horse wasn't doing very much to get the horse off the road but luckily we were all being sensible in the group as we all slowed and shouted to make sure everyone knew what was going on and to pass the horse with care. However it also meant we were carrying less speed into the final hill so when one of the girls attack it was a big acceleration to follow.  I managed to get up to
her wheel coming over the top of the hill but then tired coming up to the finish line.

Still I was over the moon to have finished and get 2nd in our group's sprint.  Once I saw the results I was even more pleased as I had finished 16th in the TT and 26th in the road race, meaning I was 26th overall on the final GC and first junior. I would like to say a huge thank you to the organisers, volunteers, marshals as well all the riders for turning up, giving it their all and making the race the friendliest and most welcoming race I've ever ridden.

After a big day of racing I took a few days to recover before looking ahead to the Scottish Road Championships which were the following weekend in Ayr. The race was the women's championship so had top Scottish riders in it and a separate junior title was being awarded to the first Under 18 rider. This meant the 4 juniors in the race were doing the same 50 mile/80 kilometres as the older women.  I was firmly of the opinion that if I finished the race it'd be an achievement, let alone thinking about wining the junior title.  The longest race I'd done this year had been just over 60kms and that was flat so the idea of over 80kms of hilly and undulating roads was making me very unsure of my own ability.

Due to the sign on opening at 7am my parents and I headed through to Ayr the day before in order to pre-ride the course. The lap was around 28kms long, with the first 15kms into a head wind and containing all the big hills - including the Electric Brae which I was told was an optical illusion that looked like you were going down when you were really going up.

I was smiling on the pre-ride…

I can firmly say that this is wrong and I certainly knew when I was going up! After a sharp descent off the Electric Brae the course turned and was a mix of descent and short ups with a lovely tailwind all the way to the finish. On the Saturday the weather was quite calm and the sun was shining, alas the weather didn't last as I was woken in the night by rain lashing against the window.

Sunday morning came around and a huge wave of nerves hit me. After forcing down some breakfast and getting my kit on we headed to the race HQ. The next hour or so just seemed to disappear and before I knew it I was getting off the rollers to head to the rider briefing. There had been 23 entries for the champs but as we gathered in it was clear there weren't that many riders.  In the end we had 18 riders take the start, including 4 junior girls (a record number I'm told) and we all rolled out behind the convoy of motor bikes and cars. The first few miles out of Ayr were neutralised which meant I could settle into the race a little and try and keep a high position in the very small bunch. The flag was pulled in, the race properly began and the paced remained fairly steady so I was feeling ok but then we hit the first climb.

It was so early in the race and with defending champion, Jane Barr picking up the pace, I was quickly out the back of the bunch and on my own. This was no surprise really and I'd discussed with my mum before hand what I should do in this situation.  So with about 70kms of lone riding ahead of me I switched to time trial mode and settled into a steady pace.  I was pushing myself but not so much I wouldn't make the finish. The rest of the first lap was fairly uneventful and I pushed on in the tailwind hoping I might see someone, but alas I didn't.

Going into the 2nd lap my parents shouted saying two of the other junior girls were also dropped and about 2/3 minutes in front  This gave me a little boost as my aim was to now close down that gap as much as possible. Coming over the top of the Electric Brae I finally spotted a rider in front of me. I knew she was close enough to catch but I still had over half the race to go so I focused to keeping a steady pace and slowly caught up to her.  Going into the last lap I made it onto her wheel and after a short rest I put in a dig up one of the smaller hills and got a gap. The wind had picked up even more and this made the climbs even tougher but I pushed on and opened a bit of a gap. I had it in the back of my mind that the next junior was somewhere up the road but with about 15kms left of the race I was having to dig deep on the final few hills and just focusing on getting every last bit of energy out.

By this point I'd been racing for almost 3 hours in pretty nasty conditions and was frozen, so changing gear began to be a serious struggle. With about 4km to go there was a long straight road and I finally caught a glimpse of the girl in front of me.  This was the final boost I needed to keep pushing to try and reduce the gap as much as I could by the finish.  I got it down to about 20 seconds by the end, but at that point I was just glad it was all over!

So after almost 80kms of solo riding with most of that as last rider on the road I'd like to say well done to everyone who rode the event, especially to Rosa Martin of PHAS-VCUK Womens Team for hanging in there with the bunch and finishing 1st junior to claim the title. Also a huge thank you to all the marshall and spectators who were out round the course and gave me lots of encouragement, it was so appreciated and helped keep me motivated. Also a thank you to Janette from Scottish Cycling who followed me in the SC van when I was last on the road. I've got a few more races this month, the highlight being a flat road race back in Pimbo, part of the Racing Chance Foundation series in the North West of England. Fingers crossed the weather will be better than last time!