Earlier this year I signed up to take part in the Lotus Cars Cycle Race League having little to no idea what to expect. Tonight was the first event of the season and I duly went along, pinned on my race number and set off on a Go Race. There were probably around 40 of us in the race I think, a large number of whom were wearing Iceni Velo kit :)

How did I do? I have no idea! I think I was in the top 20 in my race but it was hard to see who was in front of me and who was being lapped. Hopefully the commissaires were able to work it out! It was an amazing experience and I had a great time riding on such a good track, it was so smooth your bike basically just sticks to the corners. I think I could probably have done better but I foolishly decided to try and make a break with 4 laps to go, got away for a lap but was soon caught up again leaving me with not enough energy to stay in the lead group. Rookie mistake.

My Strava stats from the race itself are here if you click on the “Performance” tab you can see my heart rate, speed etc. As you can see I was doing 21mph on the corners and topping out at 28mph on the straights! It was, it goes without saying, quick.

We did, unfortunately have two crashes in our race, one looked minor but the other, on the last lap, seemed to end up in a broken collarbone. That is one of the perils of cycling though it seems.

Roll on next week!