WCC holds racing at Maffra

Again I tagged along to support Shane at today's race (he likes to think I am his soigneur, but I just chat to people and take some pics whilst he gets himself ready to race!).

Riders went through the picturesque township of Boisdale

Bruce Derham ran the race capably assisted by Kristy Glover in charge of signs. Althugh only ten riders were brave enough to face the undulations around Newry and Boisdale, it was a fun ride for a while, then it got serious! The handicapping was interesting, limit bunch of John Verey and Grant Smith left, then 13 minutes later Kristy Glover, Paul Dashwood, Dean Mackintosh and Olivia Verey leaving a further 7 minutes beforeer 7 minutes saw the Scratch bunch of Shane Dove, Mike Renehan and a Jehu sandwich started. John Verey passed the waiting scratch bunch after his first lap before they even took off and for around 4kms they didn't catch him! Obviously John thought Grant would benefit from ITT training and took off, making the most of a race on HIS BIRTHDAY.......(he chose the LG group suit for his birthday too)_.

Grant managed to hold the limit bunch off for a while on his own

Around the course, the middle bunch rode like a TTT in perfect formation and the scratch bunch were not taking things overly serious. Then it began to unravel at around the 30km mark of the 47km event, when things got serious!

Perfect TTT formation

Dean and Olivia soon became casualties of the middle bunch and Nick became a casualty of the scratch bunch. Dean and Grant decided that they really wanted to watch the finish and reneged on the final lap, which made things difficult for Bruce who was not sure how to document Deans early withdrawal from the event? He decided DNF probably the most succinct!.

Enjoying the perfect weather conditions

John Verey continues to have the fastest Limit ride recorded for some time taking line honours and then we had a cup of tea and biscuits before we saw Paul Dashwood leaving Kristy Glover behind on the final climb and muscle to the line for second, Kristy in third. The bunch sprint was a no-brainer, Chris took ANOTHER sprint victory for fastest time.



Negotiating a good handicap with club handicapper (not sure if you can see John putting his wallet back in his pocket)....he did have a sensational birthday ride...Well Done!



A birthday win for John Verey!

There was a time during the race where Nick was leading Chris (but he paid for this move later!)

It was fantastic to see Olivia Verey keeping up with the Scratch bunch for the final 15km (or thereabouts, even over some tough undulations,), this girl is improving in leaps and bounds, with some help now from Nick Jehu, the Jehu stable is getting stronger and stronger. Quote of the day was from Dean Mackintosh asking Kevin Read what happened to him? when in fact the question could have been asked the other way around. The results were a Jehu sandwich with fastest time to Chris and Lantern Rouge to Nick......huh?

Nick didn't have his best outing on the bike!



But still manages to celebrate.....

All pics from today can be seen here:- Actionpactpix website
Again there are 50 pics (over two pages in the gallery), and they will be uploaded overnight in the wee hours as they take a long time.
More information about the upcoming races can be found at Wellington Cycling Club