Report by James Sale.
Today was all about Crumpy’s points and cash.... What can I say, today we showed the other teams how to race, got Crumpy a win, 30 points (which puts him in pole position for the RR trophy), took both primes (one for Damien, and one for me). And just to top it off, we all came home £20 richer.
Just a few points from today’s action:
We tried to get Crumpy away a few times, but nothing was really sticking. Damien got away in a little group of 3 and then sprinted to the 1st prime. You had to be there, but Crumpy was stressing about it to Damien, and Damien said “I will take care of it”, next thing I see Damien off the front giving it some beans.
Eventually the race started to split up, and Crumpy got away in a nice little group of 6. I managed to get across with 4 others (free ride for me). Now we had a 10 man breakaway, which was shaky to start with, but then settled down. Crumpy was getting concerned about staying in it. But I had to tell it to him straight.... “You are the best for this finish, stay in”. The gap grew to about 1 and half minutes to the bunch, so it was time to decide what the end game was. A lead-out from the main road on a tight left hander was the plan.
A little attack went with a couple of K’s to go, but I closed it down, doing everything to save Crumpy’s legs. The left hander was upon us, and I went full on.... I couldn’t have gone any further of harder. By this point, there was just 3 of us, with about 15 bike lengths to the guys back in 4th, 5th, etc. Crump came through and I told him to “f***** go now!!” Game over, nobody was catching him. I tried to stay on some wheels, but I was cooked, managed to roll in for 8th place, not that it really matters on a day like this.
I also forgot to mention that Crumpy led me out for the 2nd prime, which ended up shredding the break away apart.... easy!
Thanks to Andy Sheridan for the photo of Bryan winning. To see more photos of the race visit http://sheridan.zenfolio.com/london_phoenix_rr2011