First Open event of 2017 entered

The Team has entered its traditional season opener, the Port Talbot Wheelers 2-up '25' in south Wales on 12th March, on the Resolven-based course R25/24. As usual, this will form part of a weekend with the equally traditional preparation which involves conspicuous consumption of curry and Belgian energy drink. On the equipment front, Grumpy Bob's SRAM eTap system on his primary TT bike is once again functional, after a two month wait for a replacement part. So no equipment excuses there. And both Grumpy Bob and Grumpy Art have been engaging in some serious turbo training. So, perhaps unwisely, Grumpy Bob is exhibiting signs of optimism.

The Year Ahead

It's that time of year when Team Grumpy starts shaking off the cobwebs and thinking about the upcoming racing season. Grumpy Bob's already made his first outing, the North Bucks Road Club New Year's Day '10'. Not brilliantly satisfactory, but at least the rain held off until the ride home. The Team is just about now planning its first event of 2017, which should be the now traditional outing at the Port Talbot Wheelers 2-up '25. This year, the event is on 12th March. So that's the first target for Team Grumpy. We have also been thinking about returning to the Duo Normand in 2017. Just to whet the Team's appetite, Grumpy Bob plotted the Team's times since 2003...

The dotted trend line is a little morale-sapping. Indeed, when GrumpyBob emailed the graph to Grumpy Art Vanderlay, he gained the following reply:

Will you stop doing this sort of thing.

Ho hum, business as usual!

Duo Normand 2016

Here is a somewhat belated post, outlining Team Grumpy's excursion to the 2016 edition of the Duo Normand.