Our group worked well together setting out at a fast pace of 39kph on the ride to Young. At 60km we were shocked by being caught by a large group; scratch was close behind, panic or not, that is the question.
At the Harden turn around we could see that scratch was about 1.5km behind us with 40km still remaining, but I was determined to ride at the front end of the now huge pack to prepare for any escape from the inevitable capture by scratch. At 20km remaining I was still on the front in the leading group which had reduced considerably due to the hot pace, the run back into Coota is super fast. Preparing for the finish is starting to enter my mind now; gone this far, would hate to lose it, over the railway down the bend, across the tracks hit the corners line up for the sprint, 10 riders I have a chance.
However, scratchies crash that thought at 10km remaining. Zooming up the outside of our bunch; I jumped in the line, determined to ride as near to the front as I could. There were no other women in the 25 rider group; I was assured of first providing I could stray out of trouble.
Everyone was jostling for positions, the pace was FAST, don’t look behind, focus on a wheel and hold it. The sprint went off all over the place and I found myself mixing it with some of the biggest male men in Australia, 14th and just a little bit hyped!
Average speed 40kph and the scratch riders broke the race record.
A great, fast day on the bike.
