Race report. Cootamundra Haycarter’s Handicap weekend.
After a cosy road trip with Simon, Mike, Becky and I in Simon’s i30 hatch, we arrived in Cootamundra at noon Saturday, to lovely weather for bike racing.
Saturday: I raced in bunch ten, seven minutes behind limit and 18 in front of scratch, which was never likely to be enough. The plan was to work with my bunch, catch limit, stay ahead of the others and win. Simple. That dream ended at 50 km when we were caught by a big bunch, with a few limit riders still ahead.
Sunday: Same bunch, same plan. We shed riders from our bunch pretty much from the start, and were down to five after the first little climb at 10 km. A woman rider (Simmone?) was doing a lot of the work, with me and a Coota rider also working, and two struggling to stay on. We caught limit soon after the first prime, and a couple of limit riders tacked on. One of these I recognised as a prime winner from Saturday, so I got his wheel leading up to the second prime, then went with 100 m to go and won it pretty easily. Into the second lap, it was me and Simmone doing most of the work. When she was on the front yet again, I dropped back and stirred the other blokes up a bit: “Does your missus do all the work at home too?” This got them working a bit more, and got me a bit of lip in return. The third sprint was at the top of a little hill, and I rode off the front and took it, to curses from the other blokes in the bunch behind. With not much more than 10 km to go we were still in front, and starting to dream….. But then a commissaire’s car came alongside and I knew it was over. The will to suffer any more just drained away and I sat up without even waiting for the riders to catch me.
Still, it was job done, two $50 primes more than doubles my career prize money.
At the end I looked for the woman rider who had done so much work in my bunch, but she was probably half way home by the time I finished.
Thanks to Simon for the lift and Mike and Becky for the company. Good feed and a few beers at the RSL, good digs too at Wallendbeen farm stay. All up, a great weekend of racing
