Apparently the rest of the country has been baking hot, but over on the A169 tonight the temperature was falling quickly and there was a niggling breeze that seemed to be in your face or side on for most of the event. I was a bit slow getting the signs out, having been stuck in traffic behind a digger, a concrete lorry, and a horse box. The delay was probably a blessing: there was a lot of traffic when we were setting up and it eased off a bit by the time we were racing.

This course is a bit faster than the Snainton course, but most riders went faster by more than the usual time difference between the two, and although there was never a fierce headwind it wasn’t an easy night either.

Callum claimed the scalp of dad Simon tonight (so will get to set off after him instead of in front of him for the next event). A combination of the new bike and not using a computer? (Some people do very well with bike computers, e.g. Tommo, who races by average speed I think, whereas others do better with nothing, with just a stopwatch, with just a heart rate monitor, or even with a power meter. The trick is to find what makes you faster!)

Also gaining time with a new bike was Dave Myers, now less than a minute behind Simon Norris. Treasurer Tim Watts (whose time I initially wrote down incorrectly – again!) just pushed the pedals harder, and is closing in on a 20mph average speed.

Pete McCauley went quicker – maybe because he didn’t have Paul Lane’s track mitt stuck to his backside? Or maybe because Paul set off a bit after he did? Dave Schubert was comfortably under 30 minutes, and Steve Samples went one better and got under 29 minutes. Rich Simms didn’t get lost this time (I suppose you could – you’d end up in Malton or on the A64…) and was just outside 27 minutes, a good time on a road bike without tri bars. (Although how Malton’s Colin Baldwin is cranking out 24:18 on a basic road bike is beyond me.)

Dave Simpson set off one minute behind Rich Simms and had him in his sights the whole race, taking over 30 seconds off him by the finish. Suitable vengeance for the mountain bike race at the weekend?

Malton’s Dave Leaming was on a recently built up fixie. That swirling wind was bothersome for us fixed-wheel riders, making it hard to ‘get on the ride’. Still, at least it’s hard to unship your chain on fixed, which was the bad luck that struck Jeff Francis, forcing him to stop and put it on.

Among the fast man, there was little to separate Mike Potter and Colin Baldwin, nor Mark Grange and Paul Hickman. But there was over half a minute between Paulo and tonight’s overall winner, Paragon’s Mick Storey – who ain’t doing bad for 60 (?).

Many thanks to Keith and Kathy Underwood for time keeping, and to ‘best holder upper ever’ Matthew Enticknap.

Next event in this series is Snainton on 5th May.

The times:

1  22:39 Mick Storey (SPCC)

2  23:12 Paul Hickman (TEF/R)

3  23:20 Mark Grange (TEF/R)

4  24:18 Colin Baldwin (MW)

5  24:20 Mike Potter (SPCC)

6  25:12 Dan Joyce (RCC)

7  25:32 Nick Hatton (MW)

8  26:13 Jeff Francis (RCC)

9  26:24 Dave Leaming (MW)

10  26:31 Dave Simpson (RCC)

11  27:01 Paul Lane (RCC)

12  27:04 Rich Simms (RCC)

13  27:53 Nick McLellan (SPCC)

14  28:07 Andy McLellan (SPCC)

15  28:49 Steve Samples (RCC)

16  29:11 Matt Hazel (MW)

17  29:18 Dave Schubert (RCC)

18  29:29 Pete McCauley (RCC)

19  30:54 Tim Watts (RCC)

20  31:46 Callum Norris (RCC)

21  32:33 Simon Norris (RCC)

22  33:23 Dave Myers (RCC)

Read original blog post

Simon Norris is now with Paragon first claim.  

---

As I recall Simon Norris signed on as RCC and he is a club member thats enough for us -any issues re Paragon first claim rules have nothing to do with our club.

Sounds another good night for you all. Well done to Mick, don't think i can use age as a reason why im slower!

From the point of view of the events we're running, the whole first claim, second claim thing doesn't matter, Callum. 

If you've joined RCC at all, you can take part in our events and compete for trophies. (Non RCC members are very welcome to take part in our time trials but can't compete for our club trophies.) So I'll write down all RCC members as 'RCC' for that reason. I'm not suggesting that everyone who has RCC against their name is ONLY a member of RCC, just that they ARE a member of RCC. If anyone has particularly strong feelings about it - I don't - I'm happy to write down both clubs, separated by a slash, like this: RCC/SPCC.

To be honest, the only time being a member of more than one club generally matters is if you enter 'open' events. That's a race you have to enter in advance and that will usually have a bigger field, made up of riders form across the region or across the country. With 'open' events, you must race under the name of your 'first claim' club for that whole season. (You can swap the following season, if you wish.)

'First claim, second claim' makes no difference to our events, which are 'club' time trials. So, for example, Matthew Enticknap is (I think) a member of both Malton Wheelers and TEF Richardsons RT. He can turn up and do an RCC race in his Malton Wheelers club strip and it's no problem at all. I won't put a blazer on, pull out a rulebook and ban him!  And I'll still put TEF/R next to his name, unless he particularly wants me to put MW there as well. In which case, I will.

So like I say, it's really not an issue - not for us, anyway. 

Can we put this one to rest…….the rules re first claim and club events are paragon rules please raise such issues with your committee. 

See my post above. And Mark's. 

Page 360, point 8 reads. 'A rider may only be a first claim member of one club and must enter Open or Semi-open events in the name of that club.'

I have put the relevant words in bold. RCC time trials are neither Open nor Semi-open events. They are club events - type B rather than type A. 

Mike you misunderstood our membership. 

You can join RCC if you are a member of any other club we have one set fee for all so members of paragon are welcome to join and compete for our trophies for our club events as a club member no problem. 

I will pm you to explain

Mike.

Okay. Here is how it works.

1. There's one membership fee (well, one for one adults, one for juniors, one for families) for joining RCC. There is no discount for joining RCC as a second club (but see 3, below).

2. We'll assume RCC is your first and only club unless you tell us otherwise. If you want RCC to be your 'second' club (i.e. second claim), you just tell us.

3. From the point of view of RCC club events, it doesn't matter whether RCC is your first club or your second club. If you are a member of RCC, you can compete for RCC trophies. There is no disadvantage in being a 'second claim' member of RCC. That's why it costs the same. The only difference is that if you take part in open or semi-open events and RCC is your second club, you cannot put 'RCC' down on the entry form and you cannot wear RCC kit in that event. That's it.

Other clubs may differentiate between first and second claim members within the context of their own events. That's up to them. We don't, and it isn't required by CTT regulations. 

I hope that helps.

As I said in the private message, Mike, we will be amending the membership form for the sake of clarity. As it stands, if the message were forgotten, it wouldn't actually make any difference from our point of view. The onus is on the rider to ride at open events etc. in the name of his first claim club. So it would only be an issue if the rider also forgot.

I think there are crossed wires about the 'first claim or nothing' issue (again, as I said in the private message). There's one membership fee and there isn't a discounted second claim rate. That doesn't mean you can't join as a second claim member if you wish. It does mean you can't join at a cheaper rate.

You can find out more about what the club offers here. (The number of members there is wrong - it's about 110 at the moment, I think.) The membership rate isn't the cheapest, but then there are more benefits - more events (e.g. bike fitting evening recently), more social rides (on road and off), more cycling trips (e.g. to velodrome, mountain biking in Peak District recently, training week in Majorca), a 10% discount at Richardsons Cycles (which could recoup the membership fee itself), and so on. 

I was racing on Sunday, Mike - on my mountain bike! Next race will be TT at Snainton. I'll definitely be at ours on Thursday 5th and may also be at yours on Tuesday 3rd. 

I'm locking this thread now. Feel free to start up others, but I think we've covered the issues about membership in detail now.