ghostlymachine – Member
I spent the best part of 2 decades getting paid (less than minimum wage) to race my bike, and subsequently getting my head kicked in by a long procession of much faster riders on their way to greater things. So where does that put me, in this thread, or the slow one?

I suspect you were / are probably the fastest here by a long way.

2 KOMs, one a random combo of tarmac and landrover track that was probably 100% due to bike choice, and one was the first 30km of a Sportive, which everyone else paced for the remaining 120km 😳

I ‘won’ the 65km category in one of the old Selkirk MTB marathons, because all the fast boys were doing the 85km (so was I, until I dropped out and completed the 65km instead. So proud).

I rode the HT550 before bikepacking or the HT550 was a thing. Except I took 16 days, not 4 😉

Have spent the entire festive break looking at my wardrobe of technical waterproof gear, and the shitty weather forecasts, and deciding to stay indoors. 😳

I am as fussy as a pro though 8)

What I’ve found interesting is how at a regional race you can get amoungst the top guys but you all know there are nationals riders in the area who’ll leave you for dead. Then you go to the nationals and your nationals heros are struggling for top tens and beating themselves up about it and then by good fortune you get to know a junior national champion and he’s fretting about getting a kicking at Worlds (He did get on the podium at cx world champs last year though)
No one ever feels fast enough.

Very much this. I’m a reasonable regional rider but quite happy to get my head kicked in at national level, and I know damn well that those national winners get a kicking by the big boys.

I spent the best part of 2 decades getting paid (less than minimum wage) to race my bike, and subsequently getting my head kicked in by a long procession of much faster riders on their way to greater things. So where does that put me, in this thread, or the slow one?

Absolutely the fastest!

A winter spin class I did I sat next to a professional road rider; she tried to get me to come out for a ride a few times but unfortunately that year I had a host of punctures.

Properly last on a few occasions, and I’ve got the results sheets to prove it

Gee
Njee
DrP
Terrahawk
Ant? AMT
MrBlobby is a TT
Lunge
TiRed
BikeBouy used to road race alot

Swoon…. 😆

Featured in the ‘fastest’ AND the ‘are you good looking’ thread (though granted, I did submit myself in that one!)..
2017 FTW 😉

DrP

What I’ve found interesting is how at a regional race you can get amoungst the top guys but you all know there are nationals riders in the area who’ll leave you for dead. Then you go to the nationals and your nationals heros are struggling for top tens and beating themselves up about it and then by good fortune you get to know a junior national champion and he’s fretting about getting a kicking at Worlds (He did get on the podium at cx world champs last year though)

It happens all the way up, even Absalon, Schurter, Froome and Contador had a kicking on their way up. It’s just a matter of how many kickings you can take before you either give up, get used to it or get fast enough not to get one.

No one ever feels fast enough.

Even the guys who win everything want to be faster, so they carry on winning.

I see I’ve been mentioned, without my permission I might add 😆

Yes, semi pro BITD for a mediocre trade team. Spent most of my time riding Colnago Masters (yip, that long ago) around the hills and dales. I did the MilkRace (for its last couple of years, 93 being the last) and plenty of other Cat1/2 road races.
TBH I wasn’t that fast, yes I could go on for yonks on the front so think of my style more like Jens or Kyri.. hang on dragging the team around until either it went up bloody hard or we’d hit the last 10k and the pretty boys got all excited.
I got bored of not getting any glory (neither did the sprinter boys) so the owner folded the team not long after me and another mate left (I already had a proper job, was finding it hard to both train/race and work) mate went off to Italy to join another team and still lives out in Florence.. he did better out there.

I ditched bikes for 10years concentrating on my love of sailing, then mateyboy came over to stay and brought his old Master for me to go out on a ride, I wasn’t about to get back into biking because I honestly hated the thought of slinging a leg over another bike.. I’d really lost the love of it. But we headed for the Downs and I quite enjoyed it so not long after bought an Orca and used that for training for sailing.. and then I kinda missed riding so took it back up again.. the rest is history best forgotten.

Fast ? Nope.. but a few years ago I surprised myself on more than one occasion. Now, we’ll im off the bike again. Kinda lost the love so taking time out and concentrating on trail running.

118th out of 300 at the Robin hood off road duathlon ?

I did win 3 gold medals at Adwick swimming club when I was 12 though..

I’ve made the list 😆

I’m a pretty decent club level racer, trouble the podium at the smaller open events, but there are a few local riders who are much faster than me. I quite regularly come up against the top 2 men from this years national 25 who make me feel rather pedestrian. Oh and the second place lady who is also very fast indeed.

The faster you get the faster the riders you come up against.

I won something recently, I had a **** off great big dog attached to my bike though, which helped. That’s teamwork.

The only thing I’m fast at currently is emptying my bowels, some bug or other giving me the runs but with no stomach pain, since Friday night!

I have a KOM. (yes, that’s “a” as in singular)

No-one is more surprised then me.

The older you are, the fastest you were.

I think I peaked in about 2013/14… at one point I was mid-teens in XC. I’ve pretty much stopped training with any sort of intensity for the last year or two. After 20 years of flogging myself it was time for a rest, I wanted to be home more rather than away without the wife every weekend for 6 months of the year, I got the travelling bug (with the wife!) – plus work crept up on me so I didn’t feel like going for a 3hr ride in the dark 3 times a week all winter… Not done an XC race in 18 months and as long as the courses are so uninspiring and short I don’t see that changing. The only events I did in the U.K. last year were Mayhem and Battle on the Beach. If Gravel Dash didn’t keep clashing with marathons in europe I’d be there too. These days I go over to the continent half a dozen times a year and bimble round some proper courses in proper mountains. Roc Ardennes, Tiliment Marathon Bike, MB Race, Alps Bike Festival, Grand Raid Cristalp, Malevil Cup, Volcatt, Extreme Sur Loue, La Tramun… I was doing quite well at Tramun this year until I stopped for 10 minutes to enjoy the cheese, the crackers and the view at a feed station 🙂

I just posted 31 Strava PR’s at Swinley this morning, in the shit.

I’m on the way up obvs. 😉