brccmag0375febmar2000

Please note: there is no issue number 375 - just two different issues of no. 374

President: C. Byers; Chairman: D. Sullivan; Secretary: R. Crane; Treasurer: T. Sykes; Editor: D. Roberts e-mail DRobe10229@AOL.com

Is summer finally on its way? The birds are chirping in the trees, the gale force winds are with us and the gritters are out and about on our roads, so I reckon we are in with a chance! OK, so I am being a bit cynical. Actually the weather has not been too bad, and I have been able to get out on Saturday afternoons without the need to wrap up in Inuit thermals and sealskins, and for the time of year, I am not feeling too bad. Let us see if I can crack the top 20 in this year’s Evening League.

I have had some interesting reactions from last month’s newsletter. If you cast your minds back I printed an article describing a ride from London to York. Well, Kevin Worsley thinks it might be possible to rerun the ride this summer with some alterations due in part to some of the route being motorway now. Obviously this needs some planning and thought, but I will be up for it. Come on all you audaxers in the club, let us get our heads together, organise and then ride this challenging excursion. Also Kevin has suggested a Bedfordshire Boarders [*I think the editor means Borders] ride. The idea is to circumnavigate Bedfordshire in a day. The distance is about 135 miles, so I think we can knock that one off on a Saturday afternoon (the Ed wakes up to the cold shock of reality.) But seriously, what has happened to the traditional club runs? To me they seem to have died out and need to be reborn. Cycling is not just about competition or winning, there is the social side too; and what better way to socialise than take part in club runs?

We ran a competition last month; all you had to do was guess what the photo was and who it belonged to. The big clue was that Terry Sykes could not enter, so obviously the mystery objects belonged to him. Now, what were they? If you are eating your breakfast I suggest you stop as it is a bit gory. The photo was of the insides of Terry Sykes’ knee during an arthroscopy. Top left is a knee which is pretty far gone, top right is a perfect example of what a knee joint should look like and the bottom two are before and after photos. Ouch Terry, that must have been painful! Although there were some inventive suggestions, no one got it right and the treasurer breaths a huge sigh of relief. You may have also noticed that the closing date for the competition coincided with the date that most of you received your newsletters. Sorry about that, it should have read as the 14^th, not the 4^th.

The annual prize giving took place at The Rose and Crown, Wootton on Saturday the 12^th of February. As usual the event was well attended, the food was excellent and the beer was strong. This was evident by an appearance from The Incredible Rubber Man, though it has to be said that he was not in our party. Dave Sullivan gave a review of the year and presented the winners with their awards [funny, but I thought it was Ron Bousted and Chris Byers presenting the prizes!], with Alan Crane taking most of the silverware. But the prize for The Best Waistcoat must surely go to Giles Henday. I cannot describe it in the confines of this editorial. It certainly was colourful but you had to be there to appreciate its finery. Nice one Giles!

Dust down your bikes dear readers, it is time to start peddling [I think he means pedalling] in earnest. So far we have had the annual Reliability Ride and the first Time Trial which took place on February 27^th. I was surprised to see only 19 riders sign on. It may only be early season, but what better time to see how your early season training has gone? A great deal of time and effort goes into organising these events and it would be nice to see a few more happy, shining faces in early season. Last year we witnessed record entries for the Evening League, let us see if we can repeat it again for the year 2000.[Although it would be nice if these people supported the club during the rest of the year - i.e. putting something back into the club - instead of constantly taking!]

All, hopefully word has spread on our good news. Betsy gave birth Sunday (2/20/2000) to our twins. I've only just been able to get at my main email address book to let everyone know. I've loaded a bunch of pictures that I took to our web site, http://users.vei.net/rjw/ all the numbers are there for them also. Go to our web page and click on 'Baby pictures!', hopefully I'll update the pages soon with more detailed info. We are still working on names! They are both in NICU currently and will be for several weeks at least, but good news this morning, our baby girl was taken off of the ventilator last night and is breathing by herself, our little boy is also doing great, but still needs help with breathing. Betsy is doing great, just a bit sore after the C-section.

Or should that be result? As stated earlier, the first event was held on the 27^th Feb in challenging conditions with the relatively slow times being recorded. There was a head wind going out to Hillfoot, but there was some advantage gained through Old Warden, though for most of the ride there was a strong cross wind, but at least the rain held off until we went home. The results are as follows:-

Pos.	Name	Time (min)	Time (sec)
1	Kevan Armstrong	31min	17sec
2	Mark Holden	32min	36sec
3	Tom Sykes	33min	29sec}
4	Kevin Worsley	33min	29sec} 2up
5	Mick Shaw	34min	43sec
6	Mark Horton	34min	14sec
7	Peter Hartley (J)	36min	39sec}
8	Chris Hartley	36min	39sec} 2up
9	David Hancock	37min	55sec
10	Ron Bousted	39min	25sec
11	Alan Room	41min	47sec
12	Peter Roberts (J)	41min	13sec}
13	Des Roberts	41min	13sec} 2up
14	David Sullivan	45min	09sec
15	Terry Sykes	45min	58sec
16	Frank Garrison	47min	18sec
17	Natalie Lewis (J)	47min	35sec
18	Warwick Davies	48min	22sec

Fast "dragstrips" usually on dual carriageways or major roads specifically chosen to be flat and fast. In our area, these are focused on the A1 and A5. Slightly further afield, routes on the A12 in Essex (in district E e.g. E72) are amongst the fastest in the country.

Sporting courses or "SPOCO", as they are usually known. Are becoming increasingly popular, as they tend not to use busy main roads. They can be more undulating and tend to be slower than "dragstrips". However, many riders find them more interesting as a result and others just feel safer using them. The choice is yours. SPOCO events are usually clearly identified in the RTTC

To enter an event, you have to complete an entry form and send it, with a cheque for your entry fee, to the event secretary listed in the RTTC handbook. All events are seeded to keep riders of similar ability apart. Seeding is done on the basis of entrants’ best times over the event distance for the last three seasons (LTS). If you don’t have any times for open events, give the organiser a call and confirm he doesn’t expect the event to be full. They may ask you to put information on times for club events just to help them seed you properly. Entry forms should be with the event secretary two weeks before the event or they can decide not to accept your entry. Hassle from people trying to enter at the last minute is one of the biggest problems for organisers so try and be nice to them by entering as early as possible.

Assuming your entry is accepted, you will receive a copy of the start sheet a few days before the event. This will list all the riders, their start times, details of the route and the event HQ and any special conditions applying to the race. It may also tell you how far it is to ride to the start – remember this when planning your journey (and your wake-up time). It’s also worth allowing a bit of time to find your way around and to warm up.

At the HQ, collect your start number and pin it on your back so it is clearly visible to the timekeeper who will be stationed at the side of the road, warm up and make your way to the start. At the start, your number will be called one minute before your start time. This gives you the chance to line up, clip into your pedals and take a few deep breaths before the off.

During the race, you will usually see marshals, signs or both at any junctions but just in case, it is worth going over the route on a road atlas, or better still in the car, before the event. You get no sympathy (or time back) for getting lost.

At the finish, call-out your race number to the finisher and make your way back to the HQ as directed. Here, there will usually be a results board where your time will appear shortly after you arrive. You can also swap your number for a cup of tea and buy a slice of gooey cake so you can wind down before heading for home.

A printed copy of the results will be sent to you anything between 2 days and six weeks after the event. Keep a record of this as you can use the time on your entry form for your next event.

For historical reasons (time-trialling was once illegal on public roads) all time trial courses have a code designed originally to hide events from the police.

Most course codes are based on a standard system e.g. F1B/10. The F denotes the RTTC district (in this case London North which is the district Beds Road CC falls under). The 1 denotes the A1 (5 is the A5 etc.) and the B denotes the second variation from the original route e.g. to avoid road works, include a new bypass or whatever. The 10 denotes the distance (10 miles). However, not all codes follow this system exactly so check the RTTC handbook to confirm the route of courses you don’t know.

When you enter an event, you will receive a more detailed description of the route, including all key road features and the location of the event HQ.

Your race jersey or skin suit must be tidy and free from advertising not related to your club.

Many events give priority entries to women, veterans or tandems. Pick these out if you are in one of these categories and want the best chance of getting an entry.

When riding your time trial, keep in towards the kerb and stay out the way of oncoming traffic. It also makes life easier for faster riders who need overtake you. If you are fortunate enough to catch another rider, either hang back to catch your breath before overtaking as quickly as possible. Or ride straight past. Do not "tailgate" as you may be disqualified. Like Formula 1 cars, you can gain an unfair advantage by letting another rider make a hole in the air for you so close quarter riding is not allowed.

Make sure you keep your head up during the race, watch where you are going and concentrate, especially when crossing junctions, roundabouts and slip roads. Drivers may not be expecting to see cyclists particularly ones travelling at 30mph or more! Your first responsibility is to yourself, don’t rely on others to look out for you.

Veterans are granted a race within a race, using a standard set of age related handicaps. At the end of the race, your time is adjusted for your age and placings decided "on standard" i.e. according to their age adjusted time. Competition amongst veterans can be fierce as older riders use their handicap to gain a new lease of life and most races will include entrants up to and even over 70.

Prizes are usually awarded to the fastest male and female riders and for the best veterans on standard and tandems. Some races will also have prizes for the best improves and for the best team (fastest team of three riders from the same club).

Most of this information is self-explanatory. The exception is the "codes" field, which may include the following:

Open time trials can be entered by anyone belonging to a cycling club like Beds Road CC that is affiliated to the Road Time Trials Council (RTTC). All events are detailed in the RTTC Handbook, a copy of which is available in the Clubhouse or can be ordered from the RTTC for £4.50 incl. P&P (send a cheque with your name and address to Dept. WWWHB 65 Kenmore Road, Whitefield, Manchester. M45 8ES).

Most time trials fall into standard distance categories. Most common are 10 and 25-mile events with several 50-mile events as well. In late June and early July you will also see several 12 hour and 100 mile events, making full use of the extended daylight.

To avoid the worst of the traffic, most events are on Saturday pm. (usually 16:00pm) and Sunday am. (between 6:00am and 8:00am). Events usually have a maximum entry of 120. While few events have full fields, in that event, it is usually the fastest 120 riders who get entries. For new riders, there are a couple of options to make sure you get entries:

Both these organise several events each year to which priority is given to members of affiliated clubs like ours.

There are other events for new/and or slower riders. These include Middle Markers events (abbreviated to "MM" in the handbook) and time limited events e.g. "slower than 1:00:00 LTS". Occasional events will also take the slowest 120 riders who enter.

In any case, if you are not sure whether you are entering the correct event, give the organiser a call and check.

I hope that this has been of some use to you all. As we now get down to the serious stuff we should all be working on our fitness and getting our times down while getting our miles in. This promises to be a challenging season for competition for the Beds Road Club. Let us not forget that we are still an amateur club in the true meaning of the word, but we live in changing times. Perhaps it is now time to look into exploring the possibilities of some sort of sponsorship arrangement as so many of our sister clubs enjoy. Already there are initiatives under way, with the introduction of a BRCC racing team, with the commitment to ride one race a month. We have to remember that most of the members have family, work and, for the youth, exam commitments to contend with. As things stand now, the average age of club members is increasing as we don’t seem to attract the young cyclists any more, and recently some of the clubs’ talent has moved to pastures greener. Let us hope that we can stop the decline in young, talented membership and keep the name of Bedfordshire Road Cycling Club alive for the next generation of cyclist

Code	Meaning
M	Events open to men only
W	Events open to women only
V	Events open to veterans
SC	Special conditions apply – usually association events where preference is given to members of affiliated clubs.
NS	Non-standard closing date – usually means entries have to be received before the usual closing date 2 weeks before the event.
B	A "Britain’s Best All Rounder" or BBAR event. This annual competition is for riders who submit their best performance over 50 miles, 100 miles and 12 hours (25, 50 and 100 miles for women) with the winner being the rider with the fastest average speed over these distances. As the number of qualifying events is limited, BBAR events can attract larger fields then normal.
H	Handicapped event.