Buller Cycling

Tuesday and we go racing, it’s what we do round here – our culture and on the Best Coast we do in sunshine and its hot hard work and everyone gives it everything. We had Linda who was going for a longer ride than usual as she is getting fit for a goal event in Nelson in honour of her father, Tjalve in the early stages of his career and just back from a race out of the district and a 4^th place finish there. Both of these riders are making the effort of travelling in from Karamea each week and with the help of partners and families putting in a big commitment to their sport.

We have Phil racing after an extended break over Christmas and stunned at the thought of his first race being to the top of Costello Hill and return. This is a hard ride with a slow climb up to Virgin Flat road and at this point you have climbed higher than the top of Costello.  Next up is the screaming decent to the base of Costello and the killer climb up the hill. Worst is if you think the work is over here, you are wrong as sometimes the decent is as hard as the climb and then on this ride you have the pleasure of climbing back up to Virgin Flat and always with the company of a screaming head wind.

So of us legends lined up for a mass start race in this game of chess on wheels and rolled out from the Fishing School on time and after the safety briefing from Steve.  The neutral zone ensured leisurely pace up to the old sawmill on the Coast road and the race was on. It was great as no one seemed to want to get going and we just rolled on. This is where the game of chess starts. Rhys (remember Rhys is semi- pro now that he is the Chris Yeats Builders trade team  CYB Racing) was the one to watch, except Steve was watching him and so I watched Steve. Rhys was about 4 riders back and on the inside of Phil and boxed in but you can’t be fooled by that as he is a pretty slippery character and would slither out and be gone in a instant if he wanted to.  We rolled on and in a blink he did just that.  Rhys was on the outside and looking twitchy and you could feel the tension building. About this time Linssey cracked on the pace and very quickly we were strung out single file and settled into around 40kph. He rolled off the front and the next rider took a turn and rolled off after a spell.

This is about where our man Rhys came in and pushed it up to around 45kph and then a big burst he was up to 52kph and a small gap opened to the rider on his wheel and then the rider was gone.  Steve closed that gap in an instant and was back onto Rhys and I was hanging on to Steve. This is an act in itself staying a few inches off another rider and pushing hundreds of watts of power to keep up when the pace is on. It took less than a minute and the race was split up in to a couple of bunches and we three were away up the road.  All was well in my world until I got sorted climbing Costello and got dropped. I held off until Tjalve caught me on the way back to Virgin Flat.  This was great with us taking turns and keeping the bunches chasing away till the end. We worked well together and so took 3^rd and 4^th placing.

Another great race in a great place on a great day on the Best Coast

Results 

Fastest Time  1^st Rhys Tait, 2^nd Steve Rodger 3^rd Peter Maich

Handicap 1^st Mike Casey, 2^nd Peter Maich, 3^rd Phil Rossiter

Submitted by Blood sweat and beers