‘As I flew down the slip road of the Spine Road, out the corner of my eye I caught the cars in both lanes below me seemingly passing in slow motion even as the passengers turned and gasped at the two wheeled comet dropping out of the skies to meet them, their dawning fear breaking slowly across their unbelieving eyes. The frightening speed, bulletlike, forced the rider’s face into a contortion reminiscent of a pink translucent balloon pulled tight across a distorted mannequins face. He struggled to hold on ...and then….and then I woke up.
It was the Barnesbury 10 this morning, ten miles of unhinged
and unfettered lunacy wrapped up in a twelve quid entry fee. I was off 13th
at 8:13am. Oh, how I love early morning competition. I was still in a dream
state at 6.30am as Mrs M left for her shift. Aunt Aggie was still snoring, the
windows rattling on each exhalation.
At race HQ, the procedure was the same as last time; arrive not
too early, have your temperature taken and get your number. No warming up on the
course and make your way to the start in good time. As this event was on my
doorstep, I felt compelled to enter, even though my training has been uber-patchy as I wrestle with a dodgy left knee. Aunt Aggie questioned my sanity
yesterday. I argued that if I could spend half the day on my knees laying the
new path at the side of the house, twenty five minutes of pedalling wasn’t going
to make much difference. She simply tutted, pulled down her swimming goggles
and carried on trying to strap herself to the neighbours lawnmower.
It was nearly a full field with 100 riders. The weather was
overcast and mild; ideal really. I did a couple of miles warm-up on the empty roads
of this New Town, not short of mini roundabouts and stretches of dual
carriageway. I had dispensed with some of the more fancy trimmings associated
with time trialling like the skinsuit and rubber overshoes, but I did buy a new
pair of Pringle type socks yesterday and thought I looked ‘the dogs’.
It took me a mile or so to get into my rhythm, my heart
caught unawares and frantically sending s.o.s messages to my brain to no avail.
I was wearing my wrist Garmin (rather than using the one that perches on the
handlebar stem) so I had no idea of my speed, but mentally, I was treating this
as an exercise with the slack aim to go sub-26, so I just rode as hard as I
could.
It was out and back and I could see some of the riders who
had set off earlier on the return across the carriageway. At 5 miles I was
passed by No15, banging out an impossible level of wattage. At 7 miles another rider came past but, by
then, the sweat had begun to drip down my clear visor and the world began
fogging up as I retreated into my own wee pain bubble. As always my posture on the bike was woeful,
jiggling around like a loon, but it was just enough to get me over the line in
25:40 and a heroic 80th place. I swear my quads inflate to match the
tyre pressures at the end of events like these.
Happy enough with the result, I packed up and cleared off. Strangely
my knee was absolutely fine and I took great pleasure in letting Aunt Aggie
know as she glided around next doors lawn in effortless if slightly noisy
fashion.
