22 Km Individual Time Trial

As noted by Ben, we had a great turnout: 48 riders participated in the inaugural QCR-ITT: 23 in the Open, 19 Masters, 2 Women, 3 Weekend Warriors (WW), and a lone Mountain Biker.  Compare this to my bike club back in the States - they hold biweekly TT's during the summer, and if 20 people enter, that's a good turnout....Just shows what an appetite there is for cycling events among the expat community here in Qatar.  Considering that there were 4 others who pre-registered but did not show, plus perhaps another half-dozen regular riders who also did not show, we have a potential of upwards of 60 riders for future events....

Weather on Friday morning was pleasant.  Although I did not record the temp, I'd guess it was in the upper 80's (that's ~30°C) with a very slight breeze from the NNW...so slight, in fact, that the only time you could tell was on the course along the backside of the race track.  Total distance for the day was 22.2 km (for the 2-lap format) or 11.1 km for the single.

Two WW entrants led off with a single lap format, with dad(?), Chikei, besting his son, Casper  (who, I believe, was also the youngest rider).....[I'm not sure, but I thought I saw dad letting some air out of son's tires just before the start.....]  

The two ladies followed with a 2-lap format.  Diane Davis posted two solid laps - both under 20 minutes to take top honors (39:30), 30 seconds ahead of Betsy Monroe (40:00).....

In the Open category, the big guns were out in force.  Malcolm G set a blistering pace, recording the fastest first lap of the day (16:52), five seconds better than the Terminator.  However, the Terminator was true to his word ("I'll be back..."), and after finding his legs, was able to negative split the second lap, recording the fastest lap of the day (16:47), securing the top spot in 33:44, just 14 seconds ahead of Malcolm G (33:58).  Ben Regan, rounded out the podium, finishing 8 seconds further adrift, in 34:06, and also negative splitting the course.  Tony Jenkins (35:06) and Jens Poulsen (35:49) rounded out the top five in the Open category.

In the Masters category, a couple of glitches in the timing program resulted in split times being missed for two riders - #112 (Thomas Rossius), and #117 (Craig Kelly).  Despite this, finish times were recorded for all (except as noted below).  In addition, there was an error in the recording of the finish time for rider #107 (Eric Z.), who circled back after finishing and was counted as finishing twice.  This error was unfortunately missed when announcing the results on Friday, but  was corrected upon review of the final times, and did result in a change to the final standings in the Masters category.  This change moved Eric Z up to 4th in the category, and unfortunately dropped Ben K. out of the top 5.  Top honors in the Masters went to Craig Kelly (34:28), with Bryan Benbow (35:59) taking 2nd, and Ed Arambarri (36:06) placing 3rd.  [Ed, was it  the lack of a pre-race Red Bull, or a late night sweeping the stones from the course??....]  Rounding out the top five were Eric Z (36:13) and Tim Murphy (37:09), whose second lap was 49 seconds faster than his first....[What's up with that?....Sounds like a little confusion over big vs small chainrings....]

The last riders of the day were our Mountain Biker (Robert T) and Jim "Crash" Bennett, who had to wait for Ed to finish so he could borrow a bike.  Unfortunately I did not get a time recorded for Jim as the timing system (my laptop) battery died....we'll have this corrected for the next event.....

Full results are posted in the file below.  For those of you who were actually timing yourselves and were wondering why your times differed from those on the certificates, note that there was an error in the sequencing of rider start positions, beginning with the ladies.  This is a bit too much to explain here, but it resulted in all times for the Women's, Open, Masters, and MTB categories being off by 1 minute....So, the times that you have on your certificates should be modified by adding 1 minute.  If you have any questions on this, please let me know and I'd be happy to explain further.....Also, if any of your names are misspelled, please let me know and I'll correct them