The first day of winter saw four of us head out to Woodend for the Mario Giramondo memorial handicap and what a banger it was. The weather was pretty miserable, Melbourne was flooded and as we headed out down the Calder it wasn’t looking too pretty - I myself was feeling pretty amped at the prospect of grim conditions.
Arriving in Woodend we had to wait around a bit because the commissaires where out checking the course for fog, something about visibility. This delay of course didn't bother Duggan or Spiro who were set up on the ergos under the team bus awning (Duggan’s old man’s van set up with a rad canopy). Mat and I decided that putting our kit on was enough of a warm up and instead took counsel from our Director Sportif, Jimmy Butler. By the time the Woodend fog had lifted and we rolled out to the start line Duggan and Spiro may as well have raced a crit.
Duggan, Spiro and I were off at 5 minutes, with Mat off chop at 1 minute 30. Limit had 25 minutes on Scratch which was going to be hard to get back as although the weather was wet. it was very still. The 5 minute group had seven riders, we all rolled turns well pushing a steady pace, giving Jimmy Butler high fives while he manned his corner. The second lap saw Spiro starting to fall off the back - no surprise really with all that time spent on the trainer...
The rest of the group kept working well; Duggan and I were loving riding in the rain. We didn't catch any groups but we were managing to hold off scratch. In the last lap and a half I was in the box; cheers to Duggan and Paul Randell for not letting me get dropped. With about 10 km to go we were caught by Scratch and Block who had joined together on the 2nd lap. I was pretty stoked with this because I was massively cooked and got to sit in till the end. Mat and Duggan ripped turns until the finish but it wasn't enough to bring back limit.
A tough day in the wet but all in all, racing bikes in the rain is fucking rad!
