Ely Hardriders 25m TT, 12 Feb 2023

Ely Hardriders is renowned for being grim. Bad weather, bad course, bad times – so of course I thought this would be a great way to start the TT season! In terms of the weather it turned out to be a fairly mild day for February. The wind, which had been my main concern, was negligible - the roads however presented a concern. Coming into the race off the back of two crashes in fairly close succession I was a little nervous, which was made worse by the fact that the roads were really greasy. (Un)fortunately I saw my minute man skid out on a corner quite close to the start which made me realise how easy I was going to have to take it round them. This led to a fairly tame start, but I was happy to stay rubber side down.

Pacing-wise the race wasn’t the best for me as I struggled to get into the zone until the last section when I realised I had about 10km left and a lot of gas left in the tank. I was happy to end on a strong finish, take 2nd in my category and match last year’s BUCS time on a much slower course. However, there is still definitely work to be done and I can’t wait to race it again next year and hopefully beat my time. Though it wasn’t quite the race that I wanted, Hardriders has made me really excited for the TT season ahead and laid a mark for me to beat going onwards.

Maddie Angwin