Steve Dennis writes…
A few weeks ago, in a fit of stupidity, I arranged to partner Mike
Coyle of VC Etoile in the SCA 2up time trial over 28 miles around the
Ashurst circuit. For those who are unaquainted with Mike, he has got to
be the hardest most determined and for want of a better expression,
ruthless road rider ’round these parts for more years than I care to
mention. Before the usual pressures of Wife/family/job took over he was
an elite catagory roadie with a fearsome reputation who still takes no
prisoners in time trials and so as the time aproached for our little
jaunt the butterflies were starting to wake up.
Mike wanted an early start so he could go off and referee a football
match later that morning, so an early start is what we got! Ten past
bloody eight on the morning that the clocks go forward and with 2
degrees of frost it wasn’t going to be a stroll in the park. We got all
togged up to ride up to the start area which was over 4 miles away and
we cut it so fine (15 seconds to be precise) that I didn’t have time to
think, or take my warming-up clothes off!
Mike set off like a rocket as expected with me clambering for his back
wheel. After about 1/4 of a mile he pulled over expecting me to come
through or something. I did my best, but with the combination of
freezing air/rapidly warming body/sudden oxygen debt, I only lasted a
couple of hundred yards. Anyway, after the initial shock, we soon
started to work quite well together and seeing as I hadn’t ridden with
Mike since the old Road Race days, seemed to know instinctlivly when to
pull over or come through.
We finished in 1hr 4mins & 36secs which was a 26 and a half MPH ride.
Not bad I thought. Mike didn’t sound so convinced. He had to shoot off
straight away, so it was left to me to sweat it out back at the HQ to
see if we’d done enough. Things were looking good as we were over 4
minutes clear of everybody else, then the last teams time was posted –
47 miserable seconds faster. But they were off an hour and ten minutes
after us and the temperature had gone up 10 degrees and blah…blah….
blah….
1st Steve Geran / Phil Sykes VC St Raphael 1:03:41 2nd Steve Dennis / Mike Coyle EGCC / VC Etoile 1:04:36 3rd Mark Winton / Andy Cox Lewes Wanderers 1:08:46
