ERC Midweek TT Series Week 13 - Love Island Edition
31 July 2019
Week 13, unlucky for some, and so it was when on the way home Rae and Hollie began to float the idea of an ERC Love Island held at Pollenca Park in Majorca. Now as a single man in his 20s, a bachelor you could say, this sort of thing sould be kind of thing I should be intrigued by, but it simply raised an eyebrow. Talking of eyebrows, I was especially sceptical as it seems the average male contestant has to wax his eyebrows and I haven’t got the time for that – shaving my legs is a big enough chore as it is.
Now to racing, some bloke called Alan Dean was fastest this evening. The name rung a bell I must admit, I have it on good authority he does the ERC TT now & again and it seems he’s not too shabby by the looks of things. Alan was 1st with 20:37. Second was Arran Gannicott with 21:08. When Arran rocked up to the start-line, epitomising fast in an almost intimidating way I didn’t know where to look, everything was stealth black & I felt incredibly insecure all of a sudden – he has the gear but the legs to back it up too, not fair. Third was Ian Dobbie with a time of 21:44, further deflating my conspiracy theory that he and Alan are the same person. Though thinking about it they were not seen together tonight…….
Louis remembered this week that if he doesn’t put clip on TT bars on he stays within the road bike category & he ended up with the fastest road bike time of 24:15. He also beat Chris Jones in the Ronde internal battle, I suspect Chris was still fazed by Louis’ Fluro-Green Power Ranger look from the chaingang the evening before, clearly mind games were at play. Colin Sills was second road bike with 24:51 and David Scott third with 25:19.
Rae Captieux was the fastest female of the evening finishing with a time of 24:50. Morgan Reilly was second with 26:00 and Hollie Begg third with 26:33. I am reluctant to praise Rae and Hollie’s efforts due to their Love Island co-conspiring after the TT – surely this could be worth a points deduction?
Steve Canney was out to post a good time to enable the ERC TTT organisers to try and claim him as Scottish. Steve has continually improved throughout the season and finished with 22:35 this evening. I’d say give him a bottle of Irn-Bru and sign him up as Steve MacCanney and it’ll all be fine.
Apologies to Ken Russell for chuckling when I was reading results out, it was solely because at that point my thoughts switched to thinking of what Ken Russell film reference I could put in the report. Trying to slot in a reference to The Devils, Women in Love or The Russia House is not as easy as you think.
A shoutout to Michael Perkins solely because he, following in Chris Borthwick's footsteps last week, mentioned he enjoys the reports and the Withnail & I meme from a couple of weeks ago. Flattery goes a long way.
Whilst writing this a member of ERC became podcast famous when they had their question read out on The Cycling Podcast – if you download the most recent episode you’ll hear Euan Munro!
Thanks again to volunteers Chris Allen, Kim McGillivray and me. I look forward to writing about my average time rather than thanking myself for volunteering next week.
Cheers
Dan