With the sun shining 9 riders turn out for the usual gentle club ride.  Stuart arrived by car having just completed an early morning around Richmond Park.   He time was slower than last time, but overall he was 25 out of approximately 80 riders, so not to disappointing.  In terms of a route today Mike suggested we head up Icehouse hill from the Henley to Marlow road to make the most use of possible shelter from the sun.

Hoping for an easy start, I suggested Stuart take up the lead (thinking he’ll be feeling the effects from the tt and not wanting to rush).  Now I don’t think Stuart tried hard enough during his TT.  We crossed Howe Lane without the group being fully together around 22-23mph!!  This set the tone for most of the ride.  The pace remain brisk into Twyford with minor attacks launch past the Twyford Winery.

I took the initial pace setting up Playhatch for about 50m prior to Ian B and most of the others taking off include more efforts from Stuart.  Ian was the 1^st to the top followed by Colin.  After a short pause at the bus shelter at Binfield Heath, we took off in a single line into Henley.  Today Rob (a spy from Thames Velo) joined us.  In Henley he made the comment that our ride had more urgency than the 10am Thames Velo ride.  Leaving Henley we joined in with the bike leg of a Triathlon towards Icehouse Hill.  We made our selves feel good by sailing past (with ease) many riders, several of whom appeared to be struggling.

After avoiding the gravel and triathletes on the Icehouse turn we all admired the horse or where they rare black lama’s in the fields on the left.  After a short pause somewhere prior to Southend we pressed on to Christmas common.  Here the main group headed right to Stokenchurch, leaving Ian to go left and back home.  Through and off broke out heading to Stokenchurch, but without the usual smooth transition.  We then shot down the A40 and eventually arrived in Watlington with the agreement to go up Watlington Hill and not Britwell Hill.  Both a pretty steep and unpleasant.   Arriving at the top we bumped into the Clock Tower group who’d ridden part of the Hilly 30 TT course.

Both groups agreed to head down the newly resurfaced Pishill and regroup at the Golf Club for a social drink.  Could we get down Pishill with an average of 30mph.  Care was taken on the early steep section and a select group of around 9 riders got together on Pishill Bank. This group included Daniel and Anastasia from the Clock Tower group.  The ride down the hill was hard work and it was good to see Anastasia coming through to take short turns on the front.  Strava does indeed show this group got down the 5.8 miles with an average speed of 30mph.

As we left Twyford for the winery sprint, myself and Colin gapped the man group by the roundabout.  I led down the hill with little idea who was behind and eventually good took a win.  It appears most of the group were on my tail and they pressed on to Shurlock Row where I eventually caught up.  For the final sprint Dan from Thames Velo took off crossing the Howe Lane roundabout and open a gap, but it appears Colin overhaul him on the line. 

Todays ride was around 52 miles and (subject to minor differences in various Strava and bike computers) completed at over 20mph.  Well done to Dan and especially for Anastasia for keeping up with us.  The ride from Pishill to Golf club average speed was just over 22mph for 18miles.