The Jenner’s took the honours today in Part I of the 2014 ACC Club Championships with Sam and Dave earning victory in their respective grades (A and C) along with Holly Harris (B-Grade) in the individual time trial on a day when the weather caused postponement of the scratch races that were to follow.

The day started off brightly enough, there was a bit of wind about but the sun was shining and it looked like events would go ahead as planned. 20 riders gathered at the town boundary on Dangarsleigh Road at the earlier start time of 1pm to ensure the action-packed agenda would be completed in wintertime daylight. The wind had picked up a bit throughout the day and was now at 40kph+ and gusting which quickly saw a few disc wheels returned to vehicles for the first event – the 20K Individual Time Trial. This was to be followed by a 30K Scratch race for B and C grade and a 40K race for A.

Wilko, Ken, Col and Bob had done a great job of organising things and with the combination of an official sign-on area (complete with table), support vehicles and a number of riders warming up on rollers, you’d be forgiven for thinking this was a major road race event.

The riders were organised into grades and Dave Jenner got things underway as he set off on what turned out to be the winning ride in C-Grade. There wasn’t really any rain at this point and the following riders, Jo Wauch, Clint Bourke and Richard Wilkinson enjoyed a relatively dry, wind-assisted outward leg. Billy Mara got B-Grade underway 3 minutes after the last C-Grade rider, accompanied by a few spots of rain but nothing like what was to follow.

When Dave Harris rolled away from the start as the first of 10 A-grade riders, the rain was starting in anger. With 1m intervals it was a bit hard to see the riders in front, partly due to the rain and reduced visibility but also due to the strong winds that saw average speeds well in excess of 40kph ensuring margins on the road were in the hundreds of metres from the start.

Bob Murison was a sight for sore eyes stationed at the 10K turn and braving the storm head-on, and yes it was effectively a storm at this point with the Bureau of Meteorology site showing that gusts over 60kph now greeted the riders as they made the turn and headed home. Judging by the great finishing line photos up on our Gallery Pages courtesy of Luke Milan (San Remo) no one escaped the heavy rain, although the later finishers got a thorough soaking on the home straight. There is also the possibility of a Guinness World Records claim for the most riders to jam themselves into a carpet layers van so watch this space for exciting news on that front.

In terms of results, Dave Jenner took out C-Grade from Clint Bourke and Richard Wilkinson with only a handful of seconds between them. It was even closer in B-Grade with a typically gutsy ride from Holly Harris ensuring she took winners honours by just under one second from Phil “The Towel” Thomas, with a very ice-cold Billy Mara in 3rd.

In A-Grade, a very rapid winning ride from Sam Jenner almost saw him crack the half-hour and take victory with over a minute in hand from Dave Rugendyke, in turn also a full minute ahead of Andrew Swan in 3rd. The only apparent casualty, aside from Phil’s towel, was Mr President himself who had a seat tube malfunction that caused him to turn and head home early once his knees had reached chin level. Unfortunately the timing system stopped before Mick Harris completed his ride although courtesy of San-Remo’s photographic record the estimated time is probably pretty close.  Apologies to Mick and if you happen to know better about your actual ride time, please let us know.

A big thank you to Wilko, Ken, Col and Bob for running the event and to Luke for capturing it for us. Also to all riders who braved the elements and who have now at least gone part-way to determining the 2014 ACC Club Champion(s). Once we’ve all dried out a little, we’ll work out what happens next and hopefully when we can reschedule Part 2. In the meantime, warm congratulations to Sam Jenner, Holly Harris and Dave Jenner!

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