Oulton Park Round 1

Greame, Steve, Cozzy, Tim, Andy, Me, Ritche, Dean, Sean, Andy, Phil and Vince somewhere

A good selection of riders made it to the first round of the TLI Oulton Park series, with tactics in hand we rolled off into the motorbike circuit.

Attacks started from the gun with Paul Bethell and Ryan Mullen striking out alone for the first lap, this was evident as they balanced clipped in at the start line. From here the race followed a pattern we all know well, break after break went away and was pulled back. I managed to get away 4 times but each attempt was failed as was Ritchie, Sean, Phil and Dean's efforts. Tim did a great job of policing from the front and as the race entered the final phase Bethell and Mullen attacked and this time it stuck. I had been following Paul's wheel but within a blink of an eye he was 4 bikes in front and I was blocked in and away they went. I attempted to jump to them but the gap was too large and I sat up and waited for the bunch. Annoyingly a second break of 4-5 riders got away and a prolonged effort from the St Helen's and Maxgear boys didn't bring it back. So it was now time for a bunch sprint and the plan was to have we 4 man lead out, so Tim, Sean, Ritche and myself stayed in the the top 10 for the last 4 laps and closed down any attempts to break away. As we entered the straight after the hairpin Sean had to use up his position to chase down an attack, then I had to go early and ended my turn on the climb leaving Ritche and Tim to have a crack, this ended in them getting about 6th in the bunch sprint.

A quick note to say that this was Graeme's first 'big race' and he finished well in the bunch, still time to sign for HTC then.

So next week more attacks and a better lead out train. All good practice.