Newport Track day

By Andy Brooke

If you would like to have a fun day out with a bit of fast pedalling and no small amount of fear you could do no better than going on a track day.

Now for the motorcyclists amongst us this does not, in this instance, mean leathers and a crash helmet, although I could have done with this protective gear after 5 minutes on the wooden boards.

The day had been organised by Trevor Parrish from the A5 Rangers and assisted by Michael Church. About 23 riders arrived at the Newport Velodrome in Gwent for the 3-hour afternoon session, 12 until 3. Half of whom had never been on a track before, so were track virgins, and you could almost smell the fear as they walked into the track centre. The other half comprised of adults that thought they knew what they were doing and kids who did know what they were doing, a dangerous combination.

Michael had managed to persuade about 12 members of our club to go and Trevor had managed to get a few riders from 4 or 5 other clubs, so it was a nice friendly mix.

I was initially sceptical about hiring a track bike because of the awful state of the bikes at the Leicester track, admittedly that was about 14 years ago, and because of them, we always used to make up our own bikes to race on. Which slightly explains my overwhelming desire to use my own bike, but I had some misgivings about the crank length, I was riding 170’s on a relatively steep track where 165’s were recommended, and about whether I could use taped on and not glued on tubs. I had spent a couple of evenings converting the bike from a fixed road TT bike into a track bike but I still had some nagging worries about it, which is why I arrived in the track centre with a 15-year-old track bike equipped with tires of a similar vintage and one of the hire bikes.

If I had known what I know now (hindsight is a wonderful thing) I wouldn’t have bothered converting and bringing my own bike. Bob, Zak and myself arrived at the track just to see everyone else fully kitted up and queuing for the hire bikes. For just £6 the hire bikes were amazing, there were Pinarello’s and Giants with carbon forks and grippy tires in all shapes and sizes to suit every rider. I put in my £6 for a hire bike and, just because I had brought it, I also started putting the wheels in the frame of my bike.

The session had been organised with a track coach, who would guide those who had not been on the track before in the art of track riding. Here was another preconceived misconception that was being drummed out of my ever doubting skull, in my naivety I thought that the coach would be an officious numpty who would take all of the fun out of the day and we would just be left to tour round and round on the track steadily getting bored.

I could not have been further from the truth; he was an approachable and knowledgeable man who helped where he could to make it a good and safe day for everyone.

The groups were split and whilst the novices were informed about track riding the others, me included, were allowed onto the track for a gentle warm up, which was to be done above the blue line to allow the novices to ride at the bottom of the track.

The track is divided by these different coloured bands, the first being the Black line which is at the bottom of the track and shows the 250 metre line, the one you should try to stay on if you are pursuiting or sprinting and is the shortest way round the racing track. The next is the Red line, which is about a metre above the black line and is designated as the line that cannot be crossed in a sprint if there is another rider below you in between the black and red lines. Then there is the blue line; this is about 2.5 to 3 metres above the black line.

I got on the bike and slowly started to circulate anti clockwise at the bottom of the track, gradually gathering speed until I could ride above the blue line.

When we were entering into the track centre we went under the actual track surface, so you could see the gaps in the boards, hear them creaking, see them moving and hear the riders pounding round up above. With that in mind now imagine me riding on the boards hearing squeaking from my front wheel and strange movement as I rode around the banking with the front wheel slipping down occasionally, however I did find that if I went faster this happened less frequently.

I put this movement and noise down to the wooden boards moving and me slipping between the cracks, I thought everybody else was feeling and hearing the same things and because no one else seemed to be complaining and as I did not want to appear to be a bit of a weedy wimp I carried on.

Now as I have said it was fine whilst I was moving quite fast, but the group was informed by the coach on a couple of occasions that this was only a warm up and that we were going too fast. This over exuberance and speed would be punished in the next session.

So the whole group obeyed his wishes and started to slow down just as we were getting onto the banking. I am afraid that it was too slow for my front tub; as the angle of contact changed, the tub decided to let go properly and rather than slipping the 1 or 2 inches it was doing before, it just went and I slammed my right shoulder and hip into the banking and slid the full distance down the banking, just in time to take another rider with me. I have come to the conclusion that one thickness of Lycra isn’t a very good material for protective clothing, but luckily I was wearing my full finger gloves and these stopped my hand from getting sore. Now that’s where the name track mitts comes from.

Luckily the person I brought down did not seem to be badly injured, just a couple of scrapes and an undamaged bike. I dejectedly click clacked my Look Keo shoe plate clad way along the concrete bottom section of the track, back to the seating area and swapped my bike for the hire bike and my shoes for the standard Look plate versions I had brought with me. I then proceeded to make my way onto the track and ride round at the back of the group. What effect this had on the novices that were watching I can only guest at, but it would explain the look of fear in some faces and the white knuckled grip on the bars.

This time there was no slipping, the hire bike was as solid as a rock and although I hadn’t had time to sort out the low seat post height before getting back onto the boards, so it felt like I was pedalling a kiddies bike, the whole sensation was quite a bit more secure and confidence inspiring.

After both groups had done the warm up the novice group came off the track and the other group were asked to do some hard riding, this is where they were to pay for their earlier exuberance.

The session involved the group riding in a line at a steady pace and at a signal from the coach they had to ride as hard as they could to catch up to the back of the group. This sounds quite easy but it takes quite a few laps to bridge that gap and after doing it a couple of times the riders off the front were noticeably slowing whist the group seemed to be speeding up.

Thankfully I was sitting this one out the excuse being that I wanted to fix my seat height. This was the only thing that could be altered on the hire bikes and they all came with standard Look pedals and these could not be changed.

Having got it some where close to the position I normally ride I continued in the next session with the novices just to see how the seat height felt, it was still not quite right but it was better than before. I am a bit nit picky when it comes to my position on the bike and I normally spend a lot of time trying to get the position just right on a bike.

This session was a nice easy one, just riding round the track on the blue line and then pulling up every half lap.

The next session was for the experienced group and I decided to stay on the track with them and do the track skill bit that they were about to do. It involved riding in a line at a steady pace leaving a two-bike length gap in between each rider and then on a signal from the coach the back rider would weave along the line between the other riders right up to the front of the line.

This sounds fine in theory but in practice most riders only wanted to pass on the straights and not on the banking and some riders left gaps that were either too small so you couldn’t get through or so large that you had to increase your pace to chase the riders down before you could weave. Personally I had no problem with the weaving even on the banking but the only thing that became noticeable was the steady increase in pace, as the riders that went through to the front did not slow down enough.  As you can imagine after all of the riders had been through once the line was moving quite fast and on the second run through we were all over everywhere. Definitely one session that would require more practice.

For next session the novices were up again, all of them seemed to be getting more confident. This time they had to do the hard session where they rode off the front trying to get to the back of the group. Punishing for all and there were quite a few wobbly legs at the end.

The next session was the sprints, here you had to ride around above the blue line as a group and on a signal the front rider would sprint around 200 meters of the track, from a vertical black line on the first banking and back to the finishing line. The fastest rider was a bloke from North Bucks with a 12:70, next was Zak with a 13:50 and then me and Gavin Hinxman tied for third with 13.74.

After doing this we all thought that now we had completed a lap and we knew what we where doing we might be able to go a bit quicker the next time, sadly there was no next time.

I will apologize for not bothering to take down any of the times and I don’t know who ended up with the final list, but if I find out and it is available I will publish it in the next newsletter.

The last event was the 10 lap scratch race. For the non-cyclist this does not mean that the winner is the one who can scratch themselves more times that anyone else in 10 laps.

We all started off by cruising round building up to a steady pace and when we were all together the race was started. For the first couple of laps everyone was quite guarded and then with a couple of riders setting a fast but steady tempo. Then with 6 laps to go Zak saw that Gavin was on the front and then he put in an effort; Zak’s reasoning was that if Gavin jumped after him and came past they could do a 2 up to the finish. As it happened no one jumped to follow him and as teammates Bob, Ian Donald and myself weren’t going to chase him down, so this left us to follow wheels whilst others tried in vain to drag him back. Zak held out to the finish and I came in second a 45 Road Club one –two and a forth for Bob.

The novice 10 lap scratch was a bit more eventful. Andy Sharman broke away from the group in the same manner that Zak did, but this time a chase took place with Sam Lawson on the front and Alan West joining him. Then after a lap or so Simon Fitzhugh tried to bridge the gap to Sam and Alan. Sam was gaining rapidly on Andy and Simon was gaining on Sam and Alan, but just before Simon reached them, Sam must have eased up to encourage Alan to come through and do some work; as he started to ease off Simon reached them and, travelling a bit quickly hit Alan’s back wheel.

Now whereas my fall was quite slow and on the steep bit of the banking so I slowed down quite quickly, Simons fall was quite a bit faster and just as he was coming of the banking and onto the home straight so he slid for quite a long way, coming to rest just before the finish line.

Alan was not brought down in the crash and went on to catch Andy and won the sprint.

By this time it was 2.55 and we were all allowed on for a 5-minute warm down, time flies when you are having fun.

I would recommend this to anyone, it was a good day out even considering the two and a half hour journey down to the Velodrome and it only cost £10 for the 3-hour session and £6 for the bike hire, a bargain.

If there is enough interest in doing another trip next year we could possibly resurrect the Celia Molestrangler trophy, and the Harrison Track cup 40 lap scratch race. Although most agreed that because Zak had won the sprint (in the club) and the 10-lap scratch that the trophies were his.

Both Simon Fitzhugh and myself came home with little trophies of our own for our track day in the form of a series of scabs that we could pick at for the next 2 weeks.

I wonder how long it would take riding round and round in one direction before you would fall over making a right turn on a roundabout?