FLCC> Bristol

[Jack Rueckheim]

Not much to report from my end, which was the back end of cat 5.  I
wanted to do the master's 45+--mostly for the added distance and safety
(certainly not because I was concerned about the challenge level!).  I
couldn't ride masters with a one day licence, so I prereged (or so I
thought) for cat 5.  Apparently, my reg didn't go through, and I failed
to print a receipt (or even get an acknowledgement).  Let that be a
lesson!  After I got one of three remaining cat 5 spots, Peter B. and I
lined up for the start.  I aimed to keep Peter in sight for as long as I
could.  It wasn't long.  I got pounded on Egypt Road, hooked up with a
guy at the top, and tried to teach him the art of two-man pacelining as
we descended to the park and started the second lap.  Either I was a
poor teacher or he was a poor learner--it wasn't happening.  He got the
concept of trading pulls, but I would have to come around him really
hard to take my pulls.  Even so, we kept picking off stragglers until we
had about six guys heading up Egypt Road, where I really struggled to
stay on and lost contact at the last hump.  After that came a TT to the
finish.  The good news--I made the top 42!  I wasn't extremely
disappoined since I had no great expectations for this race and was just
hoping for an expensive training ride.

The racing was quite fun until that last tt bit, but like Don says, it
just doesn't have the finish line atmosphere for which Hollenbeck has
become famous (I mean, for one thing, there were no cookies).  I don't
know if I'll go next year.

Jack