On any given weeknight on an arterial trunk road near you there is a high likelihood that roaming packs of mishappen cyclists will be competing against the clock. In and around Bristol there are a host of club events; the Severn, Dursley, Clevedon, VC Bristol, BSCC and others all organise a midweek “10”. This week I was down to do the organising duties. In olden times, Rob Hutchinson did everything. He deserves an OBE for services to cycling (there is no punchline here, he genuinely does).
I’ve managed big open events but this was the first time I’d done a local dust-up and had to hold the watches. It’s surprisingly tense. Everything went smoothly, it didn’t rain very much, but just enough to dent the field and meant I was able to get away before it got dark. No-one crashed, which was a bonus. This year, everyone is crashing all the time. I prefaced nearly all my sentences at the sign-on with ‘when I was going well‘, or ‘when I did my 49‘, or ‘when I was in the same race as Bradley‘, just in case people didn’t know that I wasn’t always this slow.
It was an entertaining evening. I enjoyed the cameraderie and the sense of being able to do something so that other people can have a good time and ride their bikes. It’s always good fun.
I used to get super nervous doing the timing, imagining a scenario where I accidentally pressed reset instead of lap as a rider flew by! Luckily my events all ran smoothly – with big help from the unsung heroes – the club volunteers.
ah yes, evening volunteering and the club 10 (or 25 !!) …. happy days 🙂