Kwinana Motorplex Criterium C Grade

Race information:

The Kwinana Motorplex Criterium was held on the 13 of January, and held by the Peel Districts Cycling Club. The course is a 1.6km loop and the time limit was 40+1 (40 minutes + 1 lap). A total of 15 cyclists turned up for the C grade event. 

Pre race:

When I arrived at the motorplex at 7:30AM, I met up with my good mates Ben Walton, Jonney Sammut and Cambell Smith, who were all racing in C grade. We all went and registered, and then rode a couple of laps of the course so we knew where to go when we raced. There was one sharp tight corner in the first 300m of the lap, and a hairpin turn about 500m from the finish. We all found the best way to go round these corners and discussed race plans. We moved off the course and watched the juniors, E grade and A grade race, and then did a bit more of a warm up in the car park. When the A graders had around 10 minutes to go, we started.

Race:

We started off at around 33-37kph, and the first five started rolling through turns. I was up the front and a couple of minutes in I started dropping towards the back of the group. Around 10-15 minutes into the race, Ben Walton took off and made a breakaway. The whole group started picking up the pace out of the corners, and the guy that I was sitting on did not get up to speed quick enough on one lap, and we got dropped off the back. The gap got to around 13 seconds at the most, but we had to work hard to get back on. We rolled through turns for a while until we picked up one other person, and worked together with a bit more rest after each turn, and then caught up to the main peloton after a couple of laps. One other cyclist at this point rode off to try and catch the breakaway. The group went with him and we all came back together. It was around 25 minutes into the race and Cambell Smiths coach, Stuart Denton who was also riding with us, tried to get us all working together again. We started pulling 10 second turns and then rolling off, which worked quite well. We kept this up for 15 minutes, then we got the bell lap. The pace picked up a little more and the turns got shorter. We got to half way around the lap, and there is one section where you can go to the right and the road has a slight bend to the right, which everyone usually went, and another section where you could go to the left and it was a right turn which was a bit more technical. Everyone went to the right and I saw this as a chance to get away from the peloton and try and win. I went to the left and sprinted off. Jonney Sammut managed to jump on my wheel as I got away. I was coming into the turn at 50kph and had to really slow down to make the turn. I almost went off the road on the other side because of the speed I was going. I took off up towards the finish with Jonney still behind me, and then Ben Walton overtook me. Another 3 guys overtook me and then Jonney came round me as well.

Post Race:

Ben Walton manged to nab the win, with Jonney coming in fifth and I came sixth. Cambell Smith finished behind me in 7th and Stuart Denton in 8th. I averaged around 37kph and covered around 26km. After we finished, we rode an easy lap and then went for a bit of a cool down ride afterwards. Thanks to everyone that raced and also to Stuart Denton for pulling everyone together in the middle of the race.