3 for 3

First race at Upavon Saturday, first race as a 3rd Cat.

Went very well. As newbie to course and category I planned to take things easy at the start then see how things developed. Good to see Martyn and Adam from Banjo there...

First couple of laps a bit frenetic then settled down into a comfortable pace (first 2/3 of race only 205W/248NW). The course is quite different to Hillingdon, near 2 miles oval, long section downhill then long drag to finish. And wide wide open, no tricky bends.

Feeling comfortable add mid point so started to think about getting more involved. As luck would have it a guy broke away, looking quite strong. Then another ride went to follow and I tagged his wheel and we took turns to bridge.

Lead rider seemed to know what he was doing (later found out will most likely get to 2) and we worked reasonably well for over 20 mins and made a winning gap.

Unfortunately finish was spoiled by us being caught by E12 bunch who had started 1/2 lap ahead. They seemed to be using us as a target as once caught they eased down (speaking with Martyn later they had had a hard race and were taking a breather to jockey for position ). So hard to separate from them and on climb we actually pulled ahead.

In all confusion we missed last lap indicator so no finish as such, just approached the line and lead guy saw some sort of signal to say we were finishing and put in a sprint. By time I had realised what was going on he had finished.

Confusion continued post race as we were DQed at first, for following E12 bunch. Pointed out in fact more often a case of them following us and eventually sanity prevailed and we got reinstated.

So ended up 3rd. Not bad result for first race following promotion. Bit of a shame won't be visiting Upavon again for a while.