Neil on the Podium at Cranfield

The Tricky Triangle at Cranfield has its own distinct identity. As with a lot of things in cycling, it's a love/hate thing. It's great that it's safe, predictable in terms of road surface, low traffic, and reasonably challenging. It's a bit of a hybrid; long criterium laps without the cornering risks. Intriguingly - plenty of visibility and yet a break usually succeeds.

If you're not going well it's never a good day but the Triangle seems to make a bad day

"peeanooooFoxy!" Neil tries to keep in the early break

worse. There's little in the way of shelter and every 5 minutes, you have the draggy headwind rise to contend with.

Not the sort of circuit you'd pre-empt with three bottles of wine the night before then.

Plenty of expectation of Equipe vs CC Luton yesterday as was evident at the Baines Racing LVRC race in March. Neil was on his own, but threw caution to the wind and got in an early-ish break with James Fox of CC Luton. After 3 laps though, he was struggling and had to drop off the 2up train. 

With 7 laps to go, another soft break clipped off containing once again Fox plus Richard Edwards of CC Luton, but also Jez Honor from Equipe Velo and Phil Rayner of  Welland Valley CC and a newcomer called Arlen Vartazarian who had a unique approach to through and off. Despite one or two rivals flagging him at the start, Neil made it into this move with yet another effort.

In spite of some differences of opinion, the group maintained its gap and made it over the line with a comfortable margin. "It wasn't very comfortable," he recalls. "I gave a lot of effort to the early break so by the time the sprint came, I couldn't really figure." Still, 3rd. There have been worse starts to the season. And next time, maybe a drop less wine might help.

Corley Cycles/Team MK LVRC Race April 3rd 2016
A Results

Race number First Name Surname Team
1 10 Arlen Vartazarian Regents Park Rouleurs
2 2 James Fox CC Luton
3 11 Neil Wass TMG Horizon
4 5 Sheridan Bridal Abellio SFA Racing
5 3 Michael Jackson CC Luton
6 1 Glenn McMenamin Equipe Velo
7 4 Paul Dring Echelon Velo RT
8 13 Tim Edwins Equipe Velo
B Results
1 20 Jeremy Honor Equipe Velo
2 9 Mark Daly Colourtech-RT
3 7 Simon Cannings Equipe Velo
4 19 Paul Bird CC Luton
5 17 Ian Reeds HOPE Velo
6 13 Andrew Lowe Team MK
7 18 John Watson
8 4 Michael D'Arcy Bonito Squadra Corse
9 2 John Peters CC Luton