Jim’s Winter Training Ride #1 – A Newbie’s Account

I’ve read about Jim Sampson’s Winter training sessions, and heard they can pretty tough, especially if your ambition doesn’t match your thighs.

 

Date: Saturday 3rd Jan 2015
Session Location: Brantingham
Conditions: Light winds, grey overcast, wet/dry surface, cold (around 5 degrees)

 

However being moderately fit, still hanging on to my 40s and having survived Mark Walker’s group training sessions thought I’d give it a bash.

 

I got off to a bad start, I was fashionably late by around 10 mins and missed the start of the session. I signed in, asked Jim which group I should join, middle of the class seemed to be a a good idea. I watched the ‘fast’ group ride by, they looked a bit slow. What was I to worry about?

 

Jim advised it was no use trying to get on the back of them from a standing start and that I should ride up to the junction and wait for the middle group. I took Jim’s advice, waited at the junction, ready to mix it up. How wrong was I?

 

Along came the middle group, I set off with them and we soon started to navigate the oncoming left-hand bend.

 

The pace soon picked up, faster than it had looked as a spectator, a lot faster by time we were past the bend. I was breathing heavy, thighs tightening, already suffering, what the heck, who did I think I was, “Wiggo”?

 

Thankfully by the next corner we were settling down and the through-and-off was going well. Paul Kilvington, Amanda and Neil Dean, Shaun Nicholson (who’s enthusiasm should be bottled and sold on ebay) were in the group of around 8. It was nice to see a few familiar faces. A Team Jadan member was also in the group which doubled the number of female riders, which is great, but also added to my worries about the pace towards the end of the session.

 

By the end of my first couple of laps Paul K had barked at me a couple of times to stop going through too quickly and steady off the power when coming off the front. Apologies Paul – I was out of practice, and trying to get rid of all that Christmas pudding I’d eaten.

 

Things remained settled and I’d felt pretty comfortable shouting “Clear and OK” when it was safe for the rider coming off to the front and “last man” when I was taking my turning at going through (so a rider dropping back can pull across onto your wheel without having to look back).

 

And so on to the last lap… I could see Shaun had wanted to rip things up at times with his shouts of “Come on let’s spin it up”. I’m just glad we all ignored him. When we got on to the straight before the second corner (not marshalled as it’s 90 degree bend to the left) I found myself at the front. Amanda was coming through and then started to beckon me through, I put my foot down and then heard “Steady” from the group. What was I to do?

 

Feeling OK I continued put my foot down and see how the group went, and around half way down the straight Shaun flew off ahead of the group shouting “Get on the back of that”. There was no chance of me getting anywhere near him and by now I was suffering. A few of of the group went by and got organised in front of me before the penultimate corner.

 

The fast and descending part of the lap was coming up so knew I could recover a bit, could I catch that small group which was around 10 meters ahead?

 

I kept my head down and grabbed the bottom of the drops. We got to the last last corner, now the gap was down to around 5 metres, on the home straight either the group ahead slowed up or tired, I think I just managed to pip Shaun to the post.

 

Either way, I’d survived the middle of the class group, I was feeling fab and as we all finished the sun came out, amazing.

 

After chatting to a few riders and taking a few pics I headed home feeling like I’d won a Crit.

 

Thanks and well done to everyone who turned out (around 40 riders I heard), the marshalls and of course Jim Sampson and Rich Guymer for organising the session.

 

Thanks for reading, hope you like the pics.

 

The promised pics

 

See you next week.


Mike McAllister
HTRC Member and “Unofficial Photographer”