First race of 2014, 1st March, 1st Place

alba girls 2014 line up (Amy, Suzie, Danica, Seonaid, Alison, Claire)

After a leisurely morning of breakfast, second breakfast and multiple cups of tea, team mate Claire and I set off for York to race in our first bike crit race of the year.

Claire and I caught up with fellow alba girls Amy, Alison, Suzie and Jenny and did a short team warm up-to the roundabout and back before heading to the start. Waiting to be let on to the track for a few warm up laps I realised my back tyre was soft-cue a super quick inner tube change by husband and club mechanic! Thanks to their speedy teamwork I made it on to the track in time to do a couple of laps warm up and get a good spot on the start line next to another team mate, Danica. The whistle went and we were off. Forty minutes of racing around a 1 km circuit with a lap count down from ten laps to go.

I don’t seem to be very good at remembering what actually happened during the race so a brief account of what I think happened is; I went to the front at the start; I covered any attacks by riders from other teams; I did a few attacks myself; at one point I ended up off the front of the lead group; with two laps to go Suzie did a great job of keeping the pace high at the front and going into the final hairpin I attacked and stayed away to the finish line. 

It felt great to be racing again after a long winter of training and I was really happy to win. As a team, albaRosa did very well with five girls in the top seven- a promising start to the year for Yorkshire’s fastest growing cycling club.*

Results here

Photos here

Thanks to Suzie for the group photo.

*statement based on hearsay not statistics