November 2009

The formation and registration of the Guildford Peloton has been moving forward. Perhaps not at a pace which we would have liked, but it has been progressing. The thing that has moved on most is the website. It is still being hosted on our member developers personal site as we have still to register the official site but please do take a look and give us feedback.

http://www.zarpix.com/GP/index.htm .

We are still awaiting the final designs of the shirts, the registration of the site and registration with British Cycling but those will come.

News from afar. The Guildford Pelotoners Australian associate has emailed me today to announce that despite being over the half century in age he has just won a Category D race. His wife believes that his success should not be broadcast as he was racing against kids (teenagers and girls) but he maintains there was a good cross section in the race with a number of veterans, some older than him. He is over the moon as he says "this is the only time my his life I have won anything" and to crown it he won a AUD $30.00 prize. You can see his picture and winning margin here

http://www.randwickbotanycc.com/Results%202009/5%20Dec%202009/results_5_Dec_2009.htm

In the West Sutton Little League (WSLL) (football) this season my son got selected for the "Hunters". At the first match the team manager asked the parents for a volunteer to be his assistant manager. As usual muggins here was duly elected. When I accepted I assumed (wrongly) that the assistant manager just organised on the weeks the manager can't make it. No sooner had I accepted the post than I was informed that I was now on the executive committee and needed to attend the executive meetings, and that I had to go through a CRB (Criminal Records Board check or as it is commonly known "Peado" check). Fortunately I came out clear on that as I did when the Scouts Association appointed me on to the local group executive committee.

The Tandem has come in handy for the football, the pitches being two miles from home with a lack of parking. My son and I have been cycling up and back on the tandem. I'm on the front, he is the stoker. There is a constant barrage of noise coming from behind me as we cycle. Fortunately I can't hear a word of it and just continue oblivious as to whether he is complaining or conversing (the former I suspect from the tone). Big G has agreed to do a proper road test with me in the Surrey Hills when we get the weather and can coordinate our diaries. We will have the discussion as to who goes on front and who is the stoker on the day.

Anyway, football, the Hunters started the season badly loosing a few games and starting the season at the bottom of the table. Since then we have been improving with some draws and some good wins (last 4 games have been 4-0, 5-0, 2-2, 5-0) and have clawed our way back up to the middle of the table as we have begun to gel and gain in confidence. These results haven't been without a lot of effort by Damien our manager and lots of frustration as we usually get possession for 90% of the game but seem to lack the ability to convert possession or corners into goals or even score easy goals.

My contribution has been a lot of warming the boys up with skills practice before each match, shouting during the matches, and refereeing the matches (some one from each team referees one half of the game) not to mention a near nervous breakdown each week.

There are two games left this season (the season stops at Christmas and a new season starts in January) and a couple of wins will leave us in third place in the league and in the semi finals of the cup. We can't quite catch the two top teams who started the season well but they have found it more difficult each week to keep up their winning ways. If we keep improving it certainly looks good for us in the second half of the season which starts after Christmas and the league starts afresh.

Talking of football. After finishing her degree at Leicester De Montford University (achieving a 2.1 in English and getting a prize for her dissertation) my daughter has been working at Leicester City Football Club. She has been working on the gate, with the youngsters that go on the pitch with the team, organising the half time youngsters penalty competitions and leading a "FanZone" initiative. She seems to be enjoying it notwithstanding that she is paid by the hour at the minimum wage so Dad has had still to help with the rent. She is now quite an expert on The Championship as well as Formula One.

Cycling really has taken a back seat for a number of reasons. Work has got in the way, the weather has been dreadful, I can't get out Saturday mornings because of football, and my training partner M has had a medical condition preventing him from training. Big G has committed to doing the Etape next year and he and I have tried to coordinate our diaries but thus far whilst we have done the odd ride we have not been able to get out together on a regular basis (more my fault than his, he has managed to ride most weekends).

Whilst I still have not got an entry to the Etape next year a good number of the Pelotoners have through various means (Etape.org, Cyclomundo, Sports Tours to name but a few). We will probably have more members doing the race next year than any previous years (and if we had club vests we are still not big enough to be noticed over clubs like London Dynamo, Devere and Addiscombe).

Pootle on everyone