Womack sets the standard

Chris Womack of Velo Club Baracchi started off his season with a good ride in the CC Breckland 10-mile time trial on Saturday.

Womack achieved 26:23 with lungs bursting and legs aching after having perhaps unwisely ridden Friday’s 50-mile veterans’ social ride.

Riders thankfully had a dry ride with a strong head to side wide going out to the turn with a good tail wind on the return leg on the new course from Hingham to Carbrooke and back on the B1108 road.

The winning rider was Gary Rushmore of Kings Lynn Cycling Club with a 22:07.

Among the notable veterans at the event, Chris Nudds of CC Breckland achieved 23:51 and Martin Pyne of Anglia Velo 24:47.

The veteran Time Trials Association has this year adopted new standard times for veterans and everyone gets a clean slate with new times to beat.

The idea is to remove some of the inbuilt advantage to older veterans in the old tables and try to make competition between veterans of different ages fairer.

Womack’s standard time for his 65 years is 27:58 so, on a very positive note, he started his year with a “plus” of 1:35, the time by which he beat his standard.

John Thompson rode the Shaftesbury CC 150km Audax, which was a little longer than advertised and came to nearly 100 miles.

The event started at 9am and Thompson finished just after 6.30pm.  Trouble with a stubborn rubbing mudguard made the ride harder and slowed him down, despite his attempts to sort it out.  As often happens, the problem disappeared when it no longer mattered after the event.

Thompson rounded off his weekend with a little leg loosener of 17 miles around Stebbing and Gt Dunmow.