Pluscarden 10TT

I had been looking forward to today for a few days now, ever since I managed to get a late entry to the Pluscarden 10 mile time trial mid week. I woke totally hyped up which is possibly a bad thing considering the time trial wasn't until 1400! I was bouncing around the house and couldn't settle but eventually it was time to leave.

I got up to Pluscarden, near Elgin, in plenty of time and met with the other two YthanCC members, John and Dave, we had heard that there were a few tight corners to watch out for so having so much time on our hands we built our bikes and headed out to ride the course, as we got to the half way turn, which is at a mini roundabout, Dave and John pulled out, signalled right, and sure enough every car heading onto the road at that point ignored their signal and pulled out on them, I had stopped at the roundabout as cars had entered from the right, when it was my turn I rode out, made clear signals to my intentions and exactly the same happened! Some bleach blonde girl with fake tan up to her eye balls and stupid fly eye'd sunglass, you know, the typical BINI driver, decided to pull out, thankfully or not considering I could have left a lovely scape along the side of her car, she slammed on her brakes and I safely made it round.

On the way back we also got to sample a tight corner over an old stone bridge which is just wide enough for one car, finally a time trial course with some good corners I thought, this will suit me!

We got back to the sign in hall and I still had 40 minutes before my start time, so I jumped on the turbo trainer to keep my legs spinning and ate a caffeine gel, not long before I was due to go the weather changed for the worse, the sun disappeared behind some thick black clouds and the heavens opened, within a minute of waiting at the start line I was already soaked.

The out leg went quite well, it seemed really quick and I was happy that when I made the turn the two quicker guys who started behind had yet to catch me, on the way back however the roads which appeared to be downhill felt more like a slight rise and my speed began to drop slightly. Coming into the last mile and a half I was caught for 3 minutes by another Aberdeen and district rider, and with surprising ease he simply vanished down the road, my legs had decided to pack up at this point and I still had that tricky left hand bend to negotiate. As I entered the corner I realised it was actually a bit more hairy than I first thought, the corner itself has trees and bushes in the way so you cant even see if there are any cars on the bridge, and with the road soaking wet it was a case of turn and hope for the best.

I made it back to the finish in 27:17, which is another minute quicker than two weeks ago so the times are going in the right direction. I took a shot of this bike as I noticed it has the rear wheel I am looking to buy, the guy that owned it had no problems with me looking at the wheel and his 'I've used Corima for the past 10 years' comment just made up my mind.

As I drove home I got a call from Liz asking if I wanted to go around for some food, perfect as I was too tired to be bothered cooking!