Surrey League Team TT champs

Nellie sitting happily in the Pearson shop

Last year, we entered and won the Surrey League Team time trial champs, and were pleasantly surprised when they awarded us a rather large trophy (only 3 women's teams). Our mascot Nellie, the pink Dinofrog, has been living in the trophy upstairs in the Pearson Sheen shop all year, so we had to try to defend our title, if for nothing else but to win back Nellie's "throne". It was disappointing to see that, even though the event sold out (30 entries), there was only one other women's team to compete against. A few teams are in Ireland racing in the Ras na mBan, and for others, I guess it's the end of a long season. It was also the last race of the season for Team Pink, and after making a concerted effort to race all of the London Women's League and some of the National Team Series, and having a number of injuries, there were more than a few jaded souls and tired legs amongst the pink brigade. But we managed to scrape up a team last minute, thanks to the help of one of our pink friends, Kate Hewett.

We were blessed with a beautiful hot and sunny day, but not so blessed with the Surrey traffic, with huge bank-ups around Wandsworth and Guildford, meaning we arrived about 25min before we were due on the start line. This gave us just enough time to get dressed, put our bikes together, and do 10min warm-up/practice, before arriving on the start line just as the team in front of us rolled away. I was entrusted with the job of starter, despite my effort last year when I "forgot" that I was on my TT bike, and nearly rode the whole team into an oncoming car on the first corner, as I realised too late that you can't throw a TT bike round a corner like your trusty road bike. I was much more sensible this year, and we got off to a good start on our 55km journey.

The first part of the course was semi-shaded, with lots of twists and turns and a far from smooth road surface, making us all a little cautious. However, we were soon into our rhythm and riding well, keeping tight on each others wheels and changing over smoothly. We got through the first lap in about 45min, which if I recalled correctly, was about 1.5min faster than last year. Feeling much more comfortable on the second lap, we kept the pace high and consistent, and rode as a compact unit, having to slow down only very occasionally for a few seconds to stay together. Coralie and I took advantage of the fact we were on TT bikes and hammered long turns on the front on the flat. It helped that we had already raced on the Kirdford course twice this year, and were quite familiar with the turns and undulations.

Helen, Nicole, Coralie & Kate with trophy and "reserve" mascot

With one last push over the hill in Alford and going full gas to the finish line, we crossed in 1:31:48 - 3min faster than last year, and 7min ahead of the second ladies team from Twickenham. More importantly, we crossed together with our full team intact - we had passed (or were passed by) a number of teams who were down to 3 riders. It was great fun, and we were all pretty happy with our effort afterwards. It was then back to HQ for tea and cake and the trophy presentation - Nellie has a home for another year! Our excitement grew when we discovered that we had equalled the time of the Pearson men's team! I took a photo of the "scoreboard" to start sledging them on our club facebook page. Unfortunately, the organiser informed me the next day that there had in fact been a mistake, and the men actually beat us by 43sec. Still pretty close I reckon. We'll have to wait until next year to try to knock them off.

Nicole