A great sunny day, meant that 66 riders came out to play.
The Property Scouts Handicap race was run on the Woodstock circuit from the Mabel Bush Hall.
It was great to have Property Scouts on board this year as one of the race sponsors - thanks Brad Harris.
The handicap race got under way with the two riders on limit, Shirlene and Nicola. 2 minutes later 2nd limit hit the road. Soon after the mid bunch rolled off the line 3 minutes later, hoping to pick up the first two groups.
To minutes after that 2nd mid started, followed by the 3rd mid bunch just 1.5 minutes later at 8.5 minutes. 2nd break sat on the line waiting to start with 3.5 minutes to wait, it was the biggest time gap. And after a few words with the handicapper they were off.
1 minute later break started, closely followed by the two riders in scratch, 1 minute back.
The race was on.
On the first lap limit 2 caught limit and break caught break 2. The rest of the groups stayed as is.
As the mid group caught and passed the front of the race, a small group formed. Dave McCormick, Ronan Shearing, Colin Horton and Chris Ford were on the attack, hoping to stay away. Behind them, the break groups had caught the 3rd mid group and now there was a good size group (which we will call the peloton) chasing the front. Scratch - still on their own - were still chasing everything hard. Unfortunately Chris Ford had chain problems and had been dropped from the lead bunch. The peloton quickly pulled in 2nd mid going down Dacre highway, with (most) people rolling. Now there were only four groups on the road. The front group of three, the limit groups with mid, the peloton and scratch.
On the Woodstock road heading home Colin was dropped from the leading group and was picked up by the limit group. The peloton picked up the limit group 3km from the finish with just two riders out front. Coming over the line was Dave in 1st place. Ronan in 2nd and 25 seconds later the fast finishing peloton, with Conor Shearing taking 3rd, Josh Miller 4th and Rikki Griffin half a wheel behind for 5th. Scratch unfortunately came in 2 minutes later giving the fastest time to the break group today, with Conor Shearing taking the honours with a time of just under one hour and 20 minutes.
The D and E grades were one lap of Woodstock and raced as graded races. There were 32 juniors in these two grades, which was great to see.
Unfortunately the manager on the day - raced as well so I’m unable to give a race report on these races except the results.
D grade: Rhylee Akeroyd 1st, Marshall Erwood 2nd and Reuben Heslip 3rd.
E grade: Kayne Borrie 1st, Tom Kerr 2nd (his first race, way to go Tom), Magnus Jamieson 3rd.
Thanks again to Property Scouts, for sponsoring today’s race.
A big thanks to the handicapper Waine Harding for helping out on the day and letting me ride.
Robin for manning the sign in table, Nathan for helping out with the results, Wayne and Ray for corner marshalling, Lindsay for setting up and keeping us safe and a huge thank you to all the parents who helped out with the junior races, greatly appreciated.
Report courtesy race manager (kind of) Red Burnett