Stockton Wheelers 50

Club record chasing again this morning as I got up at stupid 'o' clock (4), left the house at stupid 'o' clock (5) , to land at Crathorne Village Hall at stupid 'o' clock (7),

My ride time was 8.08am, so I had plenty of time to prepare for the ride. The course for today would be the T502/2 which is basically an out and back dual carriageway, north-south-north, this undulations, but nothing too severe. I would need to average 22.9mph if I was to overhaul the club record of 2hrs and 11 minutes - I felt reasonably confident that today would be the day that it fell !

My plan was to work into the headwind and keep an average speed of 20.5mph at the turn, and then bring home the bacon using the backwind for the final 25 miles. Sounds easy doesn't it !!

From the off, it clearly wasn't happening as the headwind seemed stronger than the 8mph that had been forecast. The undulations were draggy, and it was hard graft for sure. I kept going as hard as I could always remembering that this was a fifty, and with a good 10 miles into the turn, had managed to bring the average speed to 20.7mph - ahead of schedule, so the record was on ! All I needed now was to play out part two with that backwind......

Yeah, that f'in happened didn't it lol !

It felt like a headwind, but was in fact back/side. Maybe the trike doesn't enjoy a bit of side, or maybe I just didn't have the legs at this stage of the season, whatever it was, 25mph was not on. I still worked hard but mixed in a bit of sitting up and giving in on occasion, but even this wasn't worth the four minutes I eventually missed out on the record by. I did a wrong turn just before the end as well which lost 20 seconds, but 2hrs 15 mins was all I was capable off on the day !

To put things in perspective, that was still 8 minutes quicker than I did my first LRRA 50 in (2013) and that was on two wheels. It was also as fast as the speed I held in my first 100 mile time trial as well so I'm now reasonably happy with the ride. Roll on June and an attempt on the fastest 50 course in the country.