Steve Dennis writes…
Continuing, as it does this time of year, on the ‘hilly’ theme, our attention turned to the first of two opportunities to ride the deceptively hard 21 mile ‘Bletchingly’ circuit time trial.
The event in question being the Southern Counties Cycling Union ‘sporting’ time trial and we had two riders entered.
The course starts on the A25 just east of Bletchingly and goes west up through the village and on to Nutfield where you turn left and descend Coopers Hill and continue all the way to Chapel Road, Smallfield.
You then turn sharp left and climb up to Outwood and continue all the way back to Bletchingly taking in the brutal climb of Outwood Lane hill to complete one circuit. Then you do it all over again!
There were only 36 riders entered (probably due to the known severity of the course!), which was a shame because those who didn’t enter missed probably the best conditions for this event ever. With a breeze out of the NW, you got a wind-assisted leg down to Smallfield and because of the twisty-turny return to Bletchingly, you didn’t seem to notice the head-wind so much either. And you had the sun on your back too!
Ted Boorman was the first of us off at no.27, and after shrugging off recent illness went around in 1hr 6mins and 5 seconds. I was off thirteen minutes later in the pre-race favorite ‘last-man-off’ slot. There were several ‘fast’ guys on the list so I thought I’d have my work cut out to be in with a chance, but as it turned out, they had obviously had a worse winter than I had and I was fastest by 2 mins and 8 seconds in a time of 50:46 – a personal best for this course.
There’s another chance to have a go on this course on the 10th April in the Tooting BC promotion. Entries to John Cole by 31st March. (see handbook for details).
Results 1st S Dennis EGCC 50:46 2nd D. Dent Wightlink/Offshore RT 52:54 3rd P. Mill Team Edwardes/Elitecycling 53:27 4th G. Brent Addiscombe CC 55:59 5th R. Smith DCB-Kent 56:20 Ted Boorman EGCC 1:06:05
