Round 10 of the ATR Clubhouse Bash

• Race report courtesy of David Bavin from Dirty Wknd / www.dirtywknd.com

A race that good had to have a race report!!

Welcome back race fans, to this the culmination of the winter 2021 All Things Ride 4way Clubhouse Bash Series. And what a series we’ve had. Boasting multiple categories this season, the racing across the board has been tighter than a Yorkshireman’s approaching payday.

The A class has been dominated by the yellow and black of the Flemish lions and the green of the Yorkshire livery. The lowland hitters like Jasper Simon, Jochen De Vocht, Kristof Wielfaert Christophe Colet have been fighting it out with Team Vitfor sorry I mean Yorkshire race after race. Like a couple of drunks outside Coldbath Brewhouse on a Friday night, blows have been traded week after week, the Flemish always with the slightly longer reach.

However, no one saw any of the racing in the A category on Wednesday night for the final round, as the TV cameras were solely focused on the real fight of the series. Cycling fans in their millions tuned in to see the biggest battle since Ali vs Foreman, Borg vs McEnroe or Pantani vs Armstrong. 

The top of the B category is where the world’s press had their lens focused, and for good reason. Dirty Wknd’s Leon Parks (Rafe Sparks), surely the heir to Jonny ‘the whisper’ Secrett’s throne, versus Yorkshire’s adopted but no less prodigal son, race organiser, team mechanic, PR man and masseuse, Moray Tuach. 

One for the ages, with differing skill sets playing out on different terrains; Parks making his presence felt on the climbs, Tuach utilising his huge power on the flatter stages. Like the crowd on court two at Wimbledon, our eyes metronomically darting back and forth, back and forth. Both men eyeballing each other, waiting for a blink, a chink in the armour or a sign of weakness. 

As the riders lined up in Harrogate, Yorkshire on Wednesday night, the confidence of home roads was emanating from the Yorkshire camp. You could almost say that the riders in green were ‘glowing’, such was the trust in their process. Structured warm ups complete, aero gel applied to freshly shaved pins; every rider knew their role.

The entourage of Yorkshire super domestiques were present and correct - hardmen and Clubhouse Bash pros like Adam Jones, Rupert Visick and 2020’s Time Man of the Year “The Whisper”. But where was team leader Tuach? Emerging finally from his own ‘private’ team bus, with his own ‘private’ mechanic, Tuach took to the line, the Scotsman’s eyes locking with Parks’, neither willing or able to blink.

Juxtaposed to the slick and drilled Yorkshire machine was the rag tag, ne'er do well band of DWRT riders that had been cobbled together to try and protect their fearless leader. With most of the team ‘having something better to do’ and looking like the cast of the local production of Oliver just off stage at the Harrogate Theatre, the trackside bookies immediately lengthened their odds of a Parks victory. New recruit Hunter Thomson was wearing odd shoes, and team road captain David Bavin had borrowed his coach/dad’s bike owing to an untimely puncture on the way to the race. 

Looking more like the start of the fight scene in Rocky IV, this is how the main players for the B race lined up. GIRO's presence, not to be discounted as it would have a dramatic effect on the B result, was embodied by 3rd place overall Adam Peck. Himself well used to the pointy end of a gunfight, and armed with dedicated leftenants ready to be deployed into action, Peck wasn’t about to let this two step go ahead without him.

The start of a Clubhouse Bash race has become typified by how fast it usually is, but Wednesday’s kick off was dialled straight up to 11, as the titans of the A group went to the front and put the hammer down. It soon became clear that tactics would be the order of the day, as the Flemish did what the Flemish do and set off with a couple of the Yorkshire hardnuts to fight out their own race up front. 

Of course the TV cameras and the world’s eyes were firmly fixed on the B race battle - around the 30th place mark in the overall race. DWRT, against ALL the odds, certainly made the better fist of the start. Hunter ‘The Kid’ Thomson guided team leader Parks up the depressingly early Oatley Road climb, putting the rest of the peloton to the sword in the process. 

Road captain Bavin had been dawdling at 100 watts and inspecting his nails as the start countdown hit 2 seconds to go, leaving quite a lot of work to do to catch onto his team mates and start his work.

However the work was good, as the ATR/Yorkshire machine began to be distanced. Success in the Clubhouse Bash is all about the selection, and not missing that key break. The DWRT fast train had somehow forced the issue, and Tuach and Peck hadn’t topped up their Oyster Cards. 

As riders throughout the race found their groups and their places on the first lap, the fun of the Yorkshire KOM came and went. The gap from the Parks group to the Tuach/Peck group was firmly established, and that looked to be all she wrote. ATR had been asleep on the line, and the one thing you cannot do is fall asleep on the line. Very bad race tactics. 

Bavin and Thomson kept trying to force the pace in the ‘breakaway’ group, ensuring that no hangers on could hitch a free ride on the Parks train and things stayed suitably miserable for the ATR & G!RO doms chasing behind. 

However the crunch point came as the breakaway crossed the finish line for lap 1. Whether orders came over the team radio or this was a team bus/white board session move (or maybe he was just a bit bored), but G!RO’s Danny Roberts-Clarke put his foot down to split the group. 

Like Priti Patel tearing up the Human Rights Act, Roberts-Clake took Jacob Leigh of Yorkshire with him and set about bullying the poor, ragged DWRT hopefuls, putting Parks on the ropes with body blow after body blow. Cycling fans will forever debate whether or not this was the moment the tide turned, but the move was well timed and perfectly executed. 

The second time up Oatley Road saw Bavin and Thomson take years off their young lives pulling Parks back to the splintering group ahead. Complaining that this cycling lark was far too much effort, they swore to return to picking pockets in Seven Dials for a living. Despite protestations, contact was again made. Hope remained alive. 

However this smaller group, all feeling the effects of some big efforts early on lap 2, looked mighty tasty to the Yorkshire and G!RO chasers. With Tuach and Peck whipping their workhorses to within an inch of their lives, the chase was on! Jones and "The Whisper" danced their jig in front of Tuach, protecting their leader from all attacks, and G!RO favourite and professional sandbagger Jamie Olsson pulled the strings for Peck. The gap was beginning to come down. 

20 seconds, 18… the world was holding its collective breath as the heroes of the battered breakaway assaulted (or were assaulted by) the Yorkshire KOM one final time. With numbers on their side, the gap came tumbling down in what some would call a totally unrealistic fashion! Hunter Thomson’s one good shoe had actually fallen off by this point, but the plucky breakaway kept at their work. Careless and unflinching, the ATR/G!RO machine gobbled up the seconds like an invading force, emotionless to the destruction left in their wake. 

Rumours of tens of thousands of Yorkshire dollar being offered to G!RO’s Olsson to close the gap remain unfounded, but Olsson was seen leaving the race course in an Uber black car wearing a fur coat. Make of that what you will.

After the Yorkshire KOM, with just 4km of delightful spa town remaining to the finish, the gap of 4 seconds was holding. With 3km to go the London team were rewriting the Britannica Encyclopedia entry for ‘sporting glory’. The question began to be whispered - could they do this?

The collective exhaling of breath could be heard around the world as, on the very last turn, right in front of their Coldbath Clubhouse HQ, the Yorkshire and G!RO machine made the catch. The flicker of hope burning in the watching world went out, as Parks was overtaken by Tuach and Peck with just 100 metres to go. Having surfed the strong wheels of Jones, Olsson and Smash Hits Magazine ‘biggest crush 2019’ Jonny Secrett, Tuach thought he’d have a little dig and get his heart rate above 130 bpm for the final stretch. And that’s cycling folks! 

Battered, bruised and with only one shoe on (bystanders would later claim that his front wheel had actually fallen off halfway round lap 2, and he’d been wheeling ever since) Thomson delivered his fearless leader to the line. Parks’ brain working overtime like Russel Crowe in that film where he’s really good at maths… had it been enough. 

20 points was the cushion going into the race, and finishing a few spots behind Tuach and Peck ‘should’ be enough to seal the B cat glory for the man in black. That flame in the watching world began to reignite as the calculators came out. We wait, our breath as baited as an overladen hook in the River Nidd.

The dust will settle in time, cycling fans will breath out again, and Jamie Olsson’s tax return will be inspected with a fine tooth comb. All we know for now is that this might have been the greatest race in the history of the sport.

If you’re looking for examples of cycling heroism, don’t look for Museeuw and his broken leg at Roubaix, or Gilbert solo on the Paterburg. Look instead to Hunter Thomson, one legged and with no saddle, pulling an entire team up the Yorkshire KOM. You’ll be telling your grandkids about this one!

Thanks for a great race and series everyone. Ready for the next one!