Just doing a little warm up on the turbo...
Things started ok and I felt quite strong but the biggest problem that was giving me concerns was the sheer state of the roads round there. I felt like I was bumping around all over the place and missing potholes became a bit of an art form, what with the frequency and depth of them.
After the first up hill section of the course, I glanced at the watch to see that I was currently riding at the required speed...this was good news as I now had a long section of general downhill where I could try and increase the average speed as much as possible to limit the damage that would be done in the last 2 mile climb to the finish. Things started to not feel quite right on the bike though...I slowly realised that the front wheel had some form of slow puncture. I started to try and work out how fast it was going down and whether or not I would be able to make it to the finish, but after another couple of miles I decided to bite the bullet and get off. At this point I was averaging 43.3kph and still had some downhill section to go...it was not to be though.
The problem now was that I was stranded out on the course with no easy means of making my way back to the car. I worked out there must have been another 8 or so miles of riding to do, that was going to take a long time. Thankfully, some cycling fan in a Transit van came to my rescue. The bike had to go in the back along with some rubbish, but at least I was en route to the village hall again. My glamorous arrival back at the village hall even made it on the web... "while London Dynamo’s Richard Legge arrived at the finish in the back of a rubbish collectors van after suffering a similar problem"
http://www.bikeradar.com/news/article/uk-time-trial-round-up-tejvan-pettinger-wins-30-mile-hilly-25628
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