When you’ve done a couple of club 10 mile TT’s and finished somewhere low down the timesheet, chuffed that your time didn’t have a 30 at the front of it, what do you do next?
Road Racing? Too many crashes. Incompatible with my road-rash-phobia. Plus I would spend too much time worrying about causing a crash and breaking someone’s hard-saved-for carbon fibre.
25 mile TT? Nah, that 20-odd minutes of pain on the 10 was plenty for me thanks very much so I’m not about to volunteer for an hour of the same. What’s this? Cycle club in neighbouring town organising a Hill Climb series. Longest course only about 3 1/2 miles. That’s more like it.
Missed the first 2 events due to work, so it was that longest course that I found myself signing in for in a pub car park on a hillside on the edge of Bolton.
Photo Courtesy http://www.martinholdenphotography.co.uk/
I knew where the sign-in location was, and I knew where the finish line was (the top of the hill, unsurprisingly), but for some reason I assumed that the start line was part way up, rather than on the road adjacent to the pub car park. This was going to hurt.
“Twinkly Dave” has written an excellent description of the course and the event over on his blog. It’s well worth a read and I’m not going to reinvent the wheel by writing another when he has done such a great job of it. Suffice to say this is not one of those steady gradients where you can hope to get into a good rhythm and slog it out to the top. The gradient changes all the time and the strong headwind on the night made even the flat sections seriously hard work.
In case you don’t work it out, I was the rider starting a minute in front of Dave on the retro bike, so he took about a minute and a half out of me – mostly in the last mile! Looking at the auspicious palmares on the front page of his blog, I’m not going to feel too bad about that.
At time of writing the results sheet hasn’t been posted yet. I finished in about 14’30” and I think the winner came home in about 12′. It was good to see so many different club colours from around the region on show on the start line, and to see a number of junior and female riders taking part. Definitely a more diverse field than the TT events I’ve entered.
Photo by my Chorley CC clubmate https://twitter.com/w0odzy
The support on the hill both surprised and delighted me. Quite a few people had turned up to offer encouragement and the odd words of wisdom. A handy bench outside a pub where the course turned 90 degrees left from the main road onto the steeper part of the climb was a popular vantage point for the less energetic. Others had made their way up the road to take up position on the bends, including a lady with a large cowbell providing the full alpine climb effect.
This was the last event of the series but I will make every effort to enter the whole thing next year. Strongly recommended.
EDIT: Here’s the results:
RESULTS
Craig Battersby- 11:33.3
Adam Newall (Horwich cc)- 12:09.7
Ben Gillespie (Saddleworth Clarion cc)- 12:11.6
Karl Owen (MNC Wheelers)- 12:11.9
Billy Stewart- 12:17.3
Neil Swithenbank (ABC Centreville)- 12:19.6
David Powell- 12:39.5
Rob Richardson- 12:40.9
Mike Humphhreys- 12:41.9
Christian Suztu- 12:42.5
Theo Hartley- 12:46.3
Joe Cadwallader- 12:51.4
Chris Bodenham- 13:03.1
Paul Julien (Pro Sports Supplements)- 13:07.2
Joseph Peatfield- 13:10.9
David Headon (Horwich CC)- 13:24.3
Gaz Davies- 13:30.2
Peter Chapman- 13:41.2
Craig Sefton (Horwich CC)- 13:48.2
Steve Bone (Horwich CC)- 13:52.1
John Garnsey- 13:55.9
Martin Sackfield- 13:56
Tim Kelly- 14:06
Dave Price- 14:07.4
Neil Wood- 14:07.5
Paul Ashcroft- 14:14.9
Jacob Rack- 14:22.5
Gary Morris (Horwich CC)- 14:27.7
Alan Gibson (MCR Wheelers)- 14:34.5
Martin Horrobin- 14:37.6
Andy Porter- 14:39.7
Andrew Richardson (Bolton Hot Wheels)- 14:40.2
Neil Pope (LRC)- 14:40.4
Mark Sheffield (Chorley CC)- 14:42.5
Jack Speirs- 14:48.3
Dave Bateson-14:49.9
Daniel Hulmes- 15:05.3
David Stammers- 15:15.2
Jordan Stanworth (Bolton CC)- 15:22.2
Lee Bevan- 15:38.3
Simon Rutherford (Horwich CC)- 15:42.5
Phil Waterhouse- 16:10.2
Mick Speirs- 16:24.2
Sarah Dugdale- 16:30.8
Ben Horrobin- 16:50.5
Carolyn Speirs- 17:23.2
Matthew Hodkin- 18:22.6
Jason Miles (Went off coarse) (Team JMC)- 18:56.6
Matthew Doheny (DNF)
Tarren Cycles 
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