Out and about on winter rides

Velo Club Baracchi riders enjoyed the good weather on Sunday February 5 with two rides, a fast training ride and the usual club run.

The training ride by six riders went on a loop through Framlingham and the other ride by a similar number headed first to Halesworth and on an indirect route to Bungay and back.

Fast group

This group included two of the club’s lady riders, Nicki Hawkes and Kate Churchill.

Gathering to ride

The club run

A few riders headed to Peasenhall and Middleton and there happened upon a fellow member and a former member at the café, who had been mountain biking.

Paul Reed and Nicki Hawkes

Near Ellough

Terry Power and Mike Wood

John Thompson rode an audax ride on Saturday, called the Knights Templar Compasses and Cross 105km audax.

He said, “It’s so called as there are four pubs in this area of Essex, called “The Compass” in a geometric straight line and there are some interesting theories as to the historical reason/s for it.”

The route went past all four pubs and he got round in more or less exactly six hours without any café stops as the controls were either “info’s” or manned roadside checkpoints.

Thompson said, “That was helped by the HQ again being Witham Wetherspoons, so again it was a full English before starting.  All I ate while riding was an energy bar.  Also, again I had a good meal after finishing and two pints of Ruddles Best before ‘crashing out’ on the train.”

Places visited on the way included Heybridge, Margaretting, Littley Green, Ranks Green, Pattiswick and Gt. Totham.

There were some fair hills, particularly into Maldon town centre and a ‘sting in the tail’ with just four miles to go, although it was followed by a “soothing” descent into Witham.

Thompson was out again for a less arduous Sunday ride of about forty miles into Norfolk, returning by the Reedham Ferry and taken slowly after his long ride of the day before and was pleased to discover some new ground.

This Sunday the first open time trial of the East Anglian season has attracted four VCB riders to enter; Liam Gentry, Mark Richards, Paul Hayward and Nick Esser.

They will ride in the Ely & District CC Hardriders 25-mile time trial on a circuit in the Cambridgeshire Fens from Little Downham.

The “Hardriders” in the name indicates the anticipated difficulty of this season-opener, which usually features cold conditions and sometimes a brisk winter wind across the open Fenland landscape.

Twice in its 29-year history, winter weather has forced the postponement or cancellation of the event, most recently in 2013, so the VCB riders will be hoping for kind enough conditions to enable their rides to go ahead.