The club hired a brilliant local facility to bring our road cyclists together and provide some closed circuit intraclub racing.
With racing spread out across the region, we decided that hosting our own event would be the ideal platform to unite the club and launch our affiliated charity, CALM.
It’s easy to forget that GS Mossa is just 18 months old and in pretty much all of that time, lockdown has been enforced upon us or the racing calendar has been severely limited. Team bonding has therefore been difficult and this event presented a perfect opportunity.
The Charity
Lockdown highlighted the need to keep the focus on mental health and CALM charity provides an outlet for those needing support. The CALM mantra is to ‘Get together, do what you love and feel better for it’ which sits perfectly with GS Mossa.
CALM Homepage - Campaign Against Living Miserably | CALM, the campaign against living miserably, is a charity dedicated to preventing male suicide, the biggest single killer of men aged 20-45 in the UK (thecalmzone.net)
See here for Dave Mattingley’s blog on CALM.
The Racing
19 members made the start list for a programme of 3 races. In between each race, the track was open session. Non racing members, our family and friends took advantage of the opportunity to ride on smooth, traffic free road.
4 Lap Individual Time Trial
From resting heart rate to max, this was a test of measured high watts and bike handling on a track that was still damp in places. The chicane area proved tricky to navigate and riders had to be disciplined with their line choice and speed.
2nd Aaron Borrill
3rd Ollie Rastall
4 races of 5 laps (each with 4 riders based upon TT results) helped determine the Last Mossa Standing Finale. The winner of each heat made it through to the start line for the 8 lap race.
What started as a cagey affair quickly turned into a classic crit race with the Ollie, Adam Dart and Mark Nuttall working together to shed the sprint threat that is James Newman. With James off the back and a couple of laps to go, the screw was turned and it was Adam who lead coming out of the chicane on the final lap.
With Ollie on his wheel, the home straight provided a dramatic finish as Ollie left it late to pull off Adam’s wheel and lunge for the line. Thanks to top photography from Bob Fudge, a photo finish declared Ollie as winner by about half a wheel.
Team TT
With the clock stopping when the last team member crosses the line, this was a race all about team dynamics and leadership (plus watts, of course!). The trio of Joe, Jamie and Adam set a blistering time yet ended up only nicking the win by a matter of seconds from the 4up gang of James, Aaron, Mark and Dan.
1st Place – Joe Naylor, Adam Dart & Jamie Parkinson
2nd Place – Aaron Borrill, James Newman, Mark Taylor and Dan West
A huge thanks to Dave, Lee, Doogle, Abby, Chris and Bob for all their help in the planning and organisation of the GS Mossa Track Day. The set up looked very professional thanks to their preparation and execution.
In the words of Miche…
We Race Together.
