VCB riders Mark Womack and Joe Reynolds in duathlon
Mark Womack on his way to 47th place
Two members of Lowestoft’s cycling club, Velo Club Baracchi, took part in the Fritton Lake cross country duathlon on Sunday.
Mark Womack and Joe Reynolds both performed well in the strong field of athletes on the 3km two-lap run followed by a three laps around the country park on the bike and finally a 1.5km run to the finish.
Womack finished in 47th in a time of 54:53 and Reynolds 67th in 58:31 out of the 99 finishers. Both will be returning to compete in the next one on January 26, when they hope to improve.
On Saturday VCB members Mike Rainton, Steve Cone and John Thompson rode the Norfolk Nips 2 audax, which worked out to 100.5km. A slight diversion near Bacton and Walcott due to a flooded road had knocked 3.3km off the route.
As always the start and finish was at Hellesdon and the first stage to the info control at Weybourne was via Swannington, Cawston and Corpusty.
Thompson said, “I enjoyed the early stages to Cawston as there were several ‘first time’ roads for me. There didn’t seem to be much wind early on but it did get up but nicely gave us a tail wind through Sheringham and Cromer to Mundesley for the main control.”
After Mundesley the diversion took effect to Worsted and the riders went via Buxton and Horsham St Faith back to Hellesdon with the benefit of the tailwind.
Thompson finished a few minutes inside five hours and was pleased with that. Rainton and Cone finished in about 5 hours and 20 minutes but had been delayed. Local rider Denis Glasscock was with them and suffered a broken spoke. Cone retraced a fair way to look for him.
Many club riders were out on Sunday. The VC Baracchi club run set off and kept together to Halesworth, where decisions were made and there were eventually three different groups.
One group headed towards Dunwich via Peasenhall and Woodbridge, while another went to Goodies Farm Shop in Pulham Market and two riders took a route towards Woodton and Thwaite, stopping at the Buttercross Tea Rooms in Bungay on the way back.
Thompson had a ride of his own from Oulton Broad and said, “I started with the first stage of my “Silly Suffolk” audax route via Redisham, Rumburgh, Metfield, Fressingfield and Eye, deviating off it slightly along a ‘first time’ lane to Braiseworth and then to The Forge tea rooms at Thornham Magna Walks for a full roast lunch and dessert.”
He then continued through Thorndon, Redlingfield, Horham Stradbroke, Cratfield and Rumburgh to retrace the outward route, 77 miles in all.
