Ben Crick writes…

Conditions looked good and the forecast of winds from the south east were accurate but not perhaps as strong as suggested.

I was off 88th and was soon passed by the last man (90) and eventual winner Nick Dwyer. With  disappointing times in my last 2 25’s I was hoping to go better and perhaps get close to my season target of a low 1:04. My best last year, on this course was 1:07:48 so perhaps too hopeful.

After about 15 minutes I saw Ben Hardisty coming the other way – feeling a bit under the weather with a bug, he thought he would ride anyway, but had to back off and DNF.

Sticking to my 4 quarters strategy I rode as steady as I could for the first 6 miles and then pushed on for the next. I reached the turn around point at 23.1MPH which was well up on 22.1 MPH last year at the same point. I managed to keep pushing through the 3rd and 4th quarter to the end and recorded a PB of 1:04:27 which was very pleasing. I even won  a £20 spot prize for the best improver :-). A sub 25 for ten is next and hope to do that on G10/57 in the next 2 weeks.

Here are the results

1st Nick Dwyer 0:52:17
42nd Simon Neave  1:03:15
49th  Ben Crick  1:04:27
50th Kevin Bashford  1:04:29
DNF Ben Hardisty