Mike Anton writes…
The “end of Summer” / September / Autumn ESCA weekend features a 10 on the Saturday and a 25 on the Sunday.
Three Grinstead riders rode the 10, Chris Yates, Kevin Bashford and Mike Anton.
A calm morning with clear blue skies greeted everyone and Chris was the fastest Grinnie with a decent 23:18 effort to claim 17th overall. Having not seen much of Kev, it’s good to see he’s not lost his racing legs as he put in a solid 25:43.
Mike Anton turned up on his Full Sus MTB and was on for a evens ride when he had a rear wheel puncture at 8.5 miles. No spare meant nursing the bike home to a personal worst 34:13 and dead last.
Lewes’s Nick Dwyer claimed the top spot with an excellent 20:38.
Sunday’s event drew a good field and an excellent turnout of riders from the club.
Off N#2 out of 91, Mr Hardisty unfortunately punctured around the 7 mile mark and had to DNF.
N#5 was Mr Anton who managed to successfully complete the course with 1:01:01 and 30th overall.
Riding on a 9, Maddy Lee Smith put in a fantastic 1:04:05 to claim second lady and 44th overall.
Starting 4 minutes behind her at 63, Mr Woodward clocked 1:04:53. A welcome appearance from Ian Thompson saw him finish on 01:06:30, 88 seconds ahead of Ted Boorman (01:07:48).
On his second ever 25, Paul Turner narrowly missed out on improving his PB by clocking 1:10:54. The A22 is a totally different kind of road to the Crawley Horsham course so this was a good consistent performance from Mr T.
Unfortunately our last rider was Ben Crick who had a very eventful ride, parting company with his saddle bag as a result of one of the many pot holes on the A22. Said bag contained his expensive car key, which was promptly driven over by a following motorist and destroyed. Ben finished on 1:12:43 and Mrs C had to be called to rescue him with a spare key.
Oh and let’s not forget Mr Dennis, who was narrowly pipped to second place. Dan Sadler of RT316 claimed the top spot with 52:50, 15 secs ahead of Steve. Still, Steve was fastest vet and also beat Nick Dwyer so not a bad morning’s work.
Thanks as ever to Richard Blackmore for organising, Janet, Alan, Val, Tony, Ange, Chris, Stevie, Paul and Dani for their marshalling.
