It was a day of near ideal racing conditions, if you exclude the unseasonal cold. Hairy legs and leg warmers just about did the job in this case. So a few of us from Trinity decided to spin out to the race, there was no wind and was only about 40km anyway. In all, that ended up being a good warm up, just something to wake up the legs.
The first few ks of the race were neutralised, but at this point there were a few very unlucky souls, one on the side of the road with a puncture, another one's bike made a loud pinging sound...that means only one thing, somebody lost a spoke. So that was 2 people out of the race before the fun even started! The first lap of the race was relatively sedate, I think in the second lap (I can't quite remember), I decided to put in an attack on the descent about 2km into the second lap. I was getting a bit bored as the peloton fell to coffee spin pace. Thankfully I wasn't the only one who thought this, it didn't take long for the group to respond, and soon enough, I was joined by 6 other riders, amongst others being Joe Breheny from UCD, a pulse lad who got things organised, cuchulainn and blah blah...Before we knew it, we had a working breakaway, and it was going places! After turning onto the N1 in the second lap, we heard off the commissaire that we were about to catch the A3s'...was rather proud of that, seemed like an achievement at the time :P
Danny got caught out on his own in the headwinds on the N1, but he managed to form a chase group, and we were under pursuit. At this point, my legs were getting a bit sore given it was myself, Joe and a cuchulainn guy who were leading the race. Eventually, I heard an over-zealous "Hello There!"....oh sweet relief, Danny made it up at the front to give a hand, and not a moment too soon, needed a bit of shelter from the wind! He even said to me just to tuck in behind his wheel, and he'd finish what I started. Just at the climb after the roundabout, the alliances in the breakaway started to break down with myself, Danny and Joe doing pretty much all of the work.
This resulted in us leading out the last lap, at which point at the roundabout to take us up the R129 climb (which seemed to sap more and more legs on each time up it) my legs were just on fire, Danny even said he'd do his best to hold off the others to give me the best chance possible of a few points...They really chose a bad time for this...After the climb, they were pretty much running on empty, the combination of the bumpy road surface and rolling hills before the final climb was what finished them off. So I was dropped from Danny, Joe, and 6 others. I wasn't ready to throw in the towel, so with nothing left in the tank I came into the final climb at full gas, and realised there was no way I could catch them, and settled for 12th place. Danny managed to pull 8th out of the bag, kudos sir! Patrick Smith managed to bag 4th in the A3 race, so a very productive day for DUCC!
The first few ks of the race were neutralised, but at this point there were a few very unlucky souls, one on the side of the road with a puncture, another one's bike made a loud pinging sound...that means only one thing, somebody lost a spoke. So that was 2 people out of the race before the fun even started! The first lap of the race was relatively sedate, I think in the second lap (I can't quite remember), I decided to put in an attack on the descent about 2km into the second lap. I was getting a bit bored as the peloton fell to coffee spin pace. Thankfully I wasn't the only one who thought this, it didn't take long for the group to respond, and soon enough, I was joined by 6 other riders, amongst others being Joe Breheny from UCD, a pulse lad who got things organised, cuchulainn and blah blah...Before we knew it, we had a working breakaway, and it was going places! After turning onto the N1 in the second lap, we heard off the commissaire that we were about to catch the A3s'...was rather proud of that, seemed like an achievement at the time :P
Danny got caught out on his own in the headwinds on the N1, but he managed to form a chase group, and we were under pursuit. At this point, my legs were getting a bit sore given it was myself, Joe and a cuchulainn guy who were leading the race. Eventually, I heard an over-zealous "Hello There!"....oh sweet relief, Danny made it up at the front to give a hand, and not a moment too soon, needed a bit of shelter from the wind! He even said to me just to tuck in behind his wheel, and he'd finish what I started. Just at the climb after the roundabout, the alliances in the breakaway started to break down with myself, Danny and Joe doing pretty much all of the work.
This resulted in us leading out the last lap, at which point at the roundabout to take us up the R129 climb (which seemed to sap more and more legs on each time up it) my legs were just on fire, Danny even said he'd do his best to hold off the others to give me the best chance possible of a few points...They really chose a bad time for this...After the climb, they were pretty much running on empty, the combination of the bumpy road surface and rolling hills before the final climb was what finished them off. So I was dropped from Danny, Joe, and 6 others. I wasn't ready to throw in the towel, so with nothing left in the tank I came into the final climb at full gas, and realised there was no way I could catch them, and settled for 12th place. Danny managed to pull 8th out of the bag, kudos sir! Patrick Smith managed to bag 4th in the A3 race, so a very productive day for DUCC!
Even after the race, Joe (UCD) approached us, pretty much saying "Boy, did you lads not make that easy!"...at least its good to know we were able to put on quite a show. In all, it was a brilliant example of racing, and it would not take much convincing to return.