A new signing for 2010

We're delighted to be able to announce that we have a new rider joining us for the 2010 season - Chris Hartley.

Chris has been racing for a good few years and in 2009 was competing for North Bucks Road Club. A desire to race in ECCA events, and a link with Dave Wentworth led him to us.

Welcome to the team Chris, and here's to a cracking season of PB's (and maybe under the hour!) in 2010.

If you're interested in finding out more about the team, or would like to discuss racing with us next season please feel free to get in touch with Steve Robinson on srobinson@salesengine.co.uk

Team Salesengine at Blenheim

Sunday October 4th saw Paul and Steve competing for the last time this season at the Blenheim Palace 12 mile time trial.

The closed circuit event has a much more special feel than most events in the year, and almost 300 competitors took to the start line to battle it out on the fairly hilly, narrow and very technical cicrcuit around the grounds of the Palace.

Steve took top team honours with his time of 34:04 which proved good enough for 77th place, with Paul close behind with 35:00 to take 95th. As with so many events this year the winner was Michael Hutchinson.

PK at Blenheim!

Picture courtesy of Chris Ife.

ECCA 10 - E2/10

Saturday saw Dave Wentworth completing his final event of the 2009 season. A perfect day dawned for the event with a 3mph wind and, judging from the leg loosener ride on Friday, Dave should have been on a cracker. The first 5 miles - into what seemed like a 3mph gale - saw Dave average just 24mph, then at 6miles he suddenly got going and averaged just shy of 28mph for the last 4miles. All too late though and a 23:37 resulted at the end.

Steve gets a top 10

After a good but not outstanding season Steve Robinson pulled out possibly his best ride in Team Salesengine.co.uk colours to take 10th place in the Stevenage CC 12 mile time trial at Guilden Morden.

His time of 30:01 is his fastest ever on the quiet country lane circuit, and compared well to Richard Palmer's 27:58 (good enough for 4th spot) and David Ledgerton's 30:37.

Just the Blenheim time trial in 2 weeks time and then it is back to winter base miles in the big build up for 2010!

Picture above courtesy of Sarah brooke photography - www.sarahbrookephotography.co.uk

Icknield RC 10 - F1B/10

After a couple of weeks off racing Dave Wentworth was back in action on Sunday morning in the Icknield 10mile event on the F1B/10 course at Tempsford. Good conditions should have seen a sub 23 minute ride from Dave, alas, he never really got going and never actually made it "hurt". A disappointing time of 23:33. Hey-ho, just one more event this year - the ECCA 10 miler on the E2/10 in two weeks time.

Steve posts faster time than Bradley Wiggins

In the British Time Trial Championships Steve Robinson was representing team Sales Engine, and finished 108th in the Masters group with a 55:42 on the lumpy and rural Milton keynes based circuit.

Whilst it sounds impressive that he recorded a time 7 minutes faster than one Bradley Wiggins, the truth is that, as a senior not a Master, Brad had to ride 3 circuits instead of 2, so head to head would have beaten me by almost 15 minutes!

It was a fantastically well organised event on a nice testing course, and the chance to even compare times against an olympic gold medallist don't exactly come along too often so I'm well chuffed to have been able to ride.

Target for next year needs to be a top 100 result!

Team Sanjan Design - F2A/10

Saturday afternoon saw Dave Wentworth in action over the 10 mile distance again. This was a rare chance to ride the F2/10 course in reasonable conditions - it's usual howling winds from the South seemed to have deserted it for once with just a moderate South Westerly blowing. Despite looking at the clock wrong and turning up at the start area a good half hour too early - and then the start being delayed for 10 minutes - Dave still felt in good form for the start. Dave managed to reach the 4.5 mile turn in 11:30 but still had faster tailwind(ish) leg to come. A final time of 23:11 was a 50 second beating his course best time saw Dave being well chuffed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Beds Roads CC 25 - F1B/25

Sunday morning dawned with near perfect time trialing conditions - alas, the rising westerly wouldn't be much use to Dave Wentworth as he tackled the Beds Roads 25 miler. Not that the strength of the wind mattered a great deal in the end though. First off the zip gets stuck on Dave's skinsuit and he had to improvise with safety pins - and looks a right rag-a-muffin!! Then, just before climbing Topler's Hill going southbound Dave's gear cable fails - leaving him with just a 126 inch gear. Now, Dave's sparrow like legs, a 126 inch gear and two climbs of Topler's is an unfair contest in favour of the gear!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! However, unlike years gone by, Dave kept his cool, didn't completely "loose it" and didn't throw the bike over a hedge - but it was marginal!!! Oh, the time, a 1:02:something. Hey-ho, always next weekend.

Team Salesengine.co.uk Vs Bradley Wiggins

The start of September will witness a big showdown between Bradley Wiggins (4th in the Tour De France) and Paul King and Steve Robinson from Team Salesengine.co.uk.

OK, so in truth Bradley is unlikely to be aware of our presence at the British Time Trial Championships, but it's nice to be in the same event as him all the same.

Due to Wiggo being under 30 (and the fastest rider in the UK at present) he will be racing the mens event which is 31 miles, while Steve and Paul feature in the Masters event which is only 21 miles.

Big question is whether Bradley will do his 31 in less time than our boys can do 21! Not quite I suspect, but it could be close.

ECCA 10 - E2/10

A near perfect day on the E2/10 for Dave Wentworth on Saturday afternoon - very little wind and warm. Last time on the E2/10 Dave was a single second away from his current PB at 10 miles - this time, a 22:50 bettered it by a single second. OK, it's only a single second, but it's a new current PB - another second closer to that all life time best!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Verulam CC 25 - F1/25

A deceptively hard day on the F1/25 on Sunday morning for Dave Wentworth. Very little wind to start with so fairly even both ways, but then it really blew-up to quite a strong headwind for the final 10miles southbound from Buckden. At 22.5 miles Dave was still averaging 25.5mph, alas, that last 2.5 miles took it's toll and Dave finished with a 1:00:50.

Cambridge Uni E2/25

The E2 is reputedly one of the fastest 25 courses in the country, so Steve Robinson had high expectations of a good ride leading up to this Saturday morning event.

On the day the wind was slightly stronger than the forecasters had predicted and it took the edge off the times. Steve missed breaking the magical hour barrier but still recorded his fastest time for 9 years with a 1:01:16.

West London 50 - Stormer from PK

Paul King and Steve Robinson were competing in the West London 50 at Newbury at the weekend. Conditions were cold and blustery which made for a challenging event.

Paul was absolutely on fire, his time of 2:11:40 taking him to 27th place. Considering the hard conditions the fact that he got within almost a minute of his PB says it all.

Steve meanwhile didn't fare so well after choosing a disasterous pacing strategy. Aiming to ride at 25 pace and hang on proved too much and at 33 miles he called it a day.

Taem Ecomonic 10 - E2/10

Dave Wentworth was in action at the 10mile distance on Saturday in the Team Economic 10miler on the E2/10 course. Another tough hard wind start saw Dave recording a slow 12:45 to the turn. First objective of the ride had already been missed by this point - he was caught by minute man (just) before half -way. Stopped to a stand-still on the roundabout turn. A very fast return leg - again - saw Dave recording a 10:02 for a finish time of 22:52. Aargh, just a single second short of his current PB for the 10mile event - maybe that hold-up at the turn really did cost Dave a PB?! Most riders were indicating a hard day with times well short of their PBs - so to be just a second short of a PB and his fifth fastest ever leaves Dave well chuffed.

Photos from the National championships

22nd in the National championships!

OK, so let's not look at how many teams completed the course, better to just focus on a cracking ride by the team.

Having lulled Graeme into riding by saying it was only a 50km 3-up (31 miles) it came as a shock to find out it was in reality a 37 mile course! As we wound up for the finish the even bigger shock was that the course turned out to to 38.6 miles. The last unplanned for mile was an absolute killer as we had all left everything on the road a mile back!

Overall though we rode really well as a team to clock 1:31:43 an average of 25.3 mph for almost 39 miles. It may have been a long way off the 31mph averaged by Team Shorter Rochford to win it, but still a great result.

Highlight of the event was probably the battle with Redbridge when they caught us at 28 miles. We re-passed them 3 times, and at one stage were side by side at 28 mph just battling to get passed. Given they had caught us from 3 minutes we were always going to lose in the horsepower stakes, but the battle was fun!

Overall it was a great event, I genuinely don't think we could have done any more and the team did www.Salesengine.co.uk proud. Nice one lads!

Shaftsbury 25 - E2/25

Dave Wentworth opted to ride on Saturday in the Shaftsbury 25 miler on the E2/25 - becasue he was too chicken to ride the National 3-up on Sunday morning. A real slog to reach the 12.5 mile turn in a exactly 35 minutes - very hard and very slow. A sub-hour ride looked out of the question at this stage, but the next 5 miles to Six Mile Bottom on the return were done in just 10 minutes and Dave started to think it might be possible. But then the thigh cramp set-in!!! Even a 25:22 for the second 12.5 miles wasn't enough for that sub-hour ride. Even tough Dave had caught several riders he was a tad disappointed with a 1:00:22. Never mild, always next week!!

Early start for the National Championships

Team Salesengine.co.uk will have the pleasure of being the first team on the road at the Team Time Trial National championships on the 5th July. This means a wonderfully early start time of 06:03.

Distance is 50km and the team is Graeme King, Steve Robinson and Paul King. Other riders in the field include the current 10,25 and 50 National champion Michael hutchinson as well as ex pro Sean Yates. Don't think the win is on the cards for the salesengine boys!

Whitewebbs 25 - F1/25

Dave Wentworth was back in action again this weekend, after giving the racing a rest last weekend, in the Whitewebbs 25 on the A1 course at Tempsford. Dave never felt good and certainly wasn't "floating along", so was quite pleased to record his fifth fastest 25 ever with a 59:42. The surface on the Tempsford-Buckden course seems to get worse almost every week these days - so many bumps and potholes now that you can't take your eyes of the road ahead for a single moment!!

ECCA 10 - E10/2

Dave Wentworth rode the ECCA 10mile Championship on the E2/10 on Saturday afternoon. Although Dave got out to the 5 mile turn in 10:30, he just couldn't hold the speed over the last couple of miles. The last mile was particularly tough and just sapped all the speed from the ride. Well cuffed with a 23:15 for his best ride of the year so far, though.

Team Spirit in Milton Keynes

Sunday morning witnessed three of the four team members of Team Salesengine.co.uk battling it out to be top dog at the Team Spirit 10 in Milton Keynes.

The F5 looks like it should be a quick course, decent road surface, reasonably sheltered in parts and nice dual carriageway. Problem is that it is very draggy and despite good temperatures there was a strong headwind on the way back from the turn, this all conspired to slow times down.

Winner of the fastest man in the team award goes to Dave Wentworth who battled through the wind in 24:41 for a 21 second beating of Steve Robinson who finished with 25:02. Paul King had a bit of an off day and was a bit further back on 25:44, but he'll be back with avengance I'm sure in the next few weeks.

Didn't get time to hang on to see who won it, but we missed out on the team prize to Team Milton keynes who had a couple of guys in the top 5. Close but no cigar this time for the team prize, but our day will come!

Picture of Paul trying hard

Simon Gooderham (http://good.zenfolio.com/) took this pic of PK at the Maldon hilly. Was at the top of a 1 in 8 climb just before the finish. Hence the expression!

Cambridge 10 - F2/10

Dave Wentworth recording a 23:48 in the Cambridge 10 for his first competitive event in Team salesengine.co.uk colours. As usual on the F2/10 "that wind" was blowing down the course.

Good photo

Nice photo taken at the victoria CC by Sportinpictures.com Time to lose a bit of weight though!

Victoria CC E1/10.2

I've got a sort of love/hate relationship with the E1. It always feels like a really safe course to ride and there are some cracking points where there are walls on both sides and the noise of the disk reverberates around you which is cool. Problem is that it is so damn hard as well.

I was the only representative of the team on the start sheet today as Paul's entry got there too late, but he came out and rode a private time trial after the last man had gone to get some racing in his legs.

It was a tailwind out and the course drops steadily to the turn and I got there in 11:10 and then it was a major battle into the teeth of the wind on the way back. Finished with 25:59 which was dead on the same time that PK managed according to his clock, but as he didn't have a number on his back the moral victory probably has to go to him!

Winner was Richard O'Rourke in a faintly ridiculous 21:44 and only one other guy went inside a 23. Waiting on final results to find out the placings, but overall am happy with the ride.

Time to focus now to prepare for the Team Spirit 10 next Sunday as we have 3 of us riding and it should be a good battle to see who is quickest!

Steve