Report from John Warnock:-
Quite a breezy day for a TT - if you're riding on tri-bars!
Des showed real grit by riding to the start into the headwind and looked like he'd found it quite invigorating!
Gavin sensibly left the fixed wheel bike in the shed this year, and with a winter of mileage behind him was hoping for a distinct increase in speed.
Much fretting before the start as to how much kit to wear - it was beautifully sunny but the wind had a chill to it. Fortunately I'd only brought one set of leggings and a thermal base layer so they went on under the skin-suit and turned out to be a pretty good compromise.
Riding up to and beyond the start to warm up it became apparent that it really was quite windy with gusts being sufficient to knock the bike off course by anything up to a foot which made dodging the pot holes that bit more challenging!
Conditions were slow on the way out and with Des leading off the Twickenham 3, followed by Gav and myself.
We contrived to pass the HQ on the outward leg at the same time, giving a red-arrows-esque flypast in red, white and blue - Sort of.
Payback for the hard work on the way out was a lightening return leg such that even the incline up to the HQ was a lot easier than last year and the run in to the line made mid-30s in mph possible on the flat.
Looking at the results today Gavin has made a big increase in speed over last year, despite the conditions and Des showed that riding a TT needn't mean driving your precious bike to the start.
I seem to have, ahem, lost some speed since last year - I'll check down the back of the sofa before the next TT.
