Race Report

Just two weeks after rearranging the record books they were back at it with twice the vigour: Matt Burton was first to finish the ten laps in a new record time and then it was the women's turn with the first three AGAIN all posting times better than the previous record; this time Emily Mascaro slotted into third spot behind the numbers one and two from the '40', Rachael Wales and Kirsty Turner. To do this, she swapped places with Steff VanA who, nevertheless, stripped three minutes from her previous best on the 10-lap course. There was not much daylight between Rachael and Kirsty this time though—a very meagre four seconds and Kirsty actually was well ahead after her first five laps but faded a bit in the second half—effect of the rising temperature perhaps? It was getting a bit warm out on course (35° in the shade of the timing hutch as the last finisher passed through) but started off very nicely; even the wind was well behaved in the earlier part but exerted itself a bit more as the morning played out.

Matt also gets his name scratched onto the plinth of the Jack Norris trophy, having the best Standards time. The Silver and Bronze place-getters amongst the Masters mob, Colin Rose and Michael Moohan, also were very nicely placed in the fast–ten with Michael, at number ten, neatly rounding out the 40km/h group; Colin added yet another PB to his collection. Unfortunately, the heat obviously played a big role in the long list of DNFs—there were a few punctures with Chris Balde probably the unluckiest of that bunch, not even making it onto the start line. At the other extreme, Paul Van der Walt suffered both: a puncture, a restart and then the heat. He reckoned he had budgeted for 83km not the 100+ he actually rode and needed a pit stop a lap from the end to attempt to re-hydrate.

Stu Helm swapped from being on the receiving end at the medal presentations for the '40' to being the presenter-of-medals and desk-manager this time (he got his day's ride in getting to and from the event); Karen Bishop was our number caller and marshal-at-the-start for the early part of the morning until our new starter, Karl McIntyre took over, having sent 80 riders on their way. Out on course were Kyla Gilbertson, Alex Wainwright and David Thompson plus the QTM crew on the tricky feed onto Lyon Rd. Iain MacLennan was there setting up the course from sometime before 5:30 and still there to collect the signage at the end while Lorraine fulfilled her usual number of roles, one of them being the handover to Karl. Mark Oakes came down to support Karen and found himself with the job of keeping errant TTers out of the equestrian centre parking area (bikes and horses are not a good mix). Thanks Mark, thank you all and my particular thanks to Amos for another fine, stress-relieving cup of tea.