The course was described as technical (read some tight turns round a few trees, steps and a nice off camber grassy slope) but the even more technical nature of crossing a concrete velodrome seemed to catch a few riders out. Thankfully Paul Bennett persuaded the organisers that barriers at the bottom end of a descent were not the best idea.

Martyn Heritage-Owen is organising some Derny training sessions at Newport Velodrome and anyone interested should contact Martyn at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .  Cost is £10 for seniors and £5 for juniors.

The next derny session is on 13th November from 5-5pm (£10 seniors, £5 juniors).

Other dates planned are:

26th November 7-9pm (£15 seniors, £10 juniors)

27th December 10am-noon (£15 seniors, £10 juniors)

30th December 2-4pm (£15 seniors, £10 juniors)

The gridded start was fast. Super fast in fact and after getting away reasonably well, I found a new gear I didn't know I had; reverse. Fortunately the other JIF riders had their gears well and truly stuck in 'high' (or 'forward' as I prefer to think of it) with Matt, Adam and Mark jockeying for position at the front and fellow vets Donald and Paul following not far behind. The well laid out course provided loads of opportunity for support and it certainly buoyed the JIF vets who kept pulling through the field.

The eventual winner was Joe Lally (CC Abergavenny) with Adam King finishing not far behind in 3rd place/1st Junior; another superb performance. Mark Davies was 4th, Matt Thomson 6th/2nd Junior (more good stuff), Donald with an excellent 13th (3rd Vet) Paul in 16th (4th Vet), me in 23rd (5th Vet) and Phil Caunt in 51st. A great day's racing and once again JIF truly in the mix with a whole stack of podium finishes. Next week we're under the floodlights of Carmarthen. Should be fun.

A few upcoming events for members to be aware of:

Cardiff Ajax - Griffin Mill / Dolan / Castle Cycles Races

Ajax are organising two 3/4 races at Maindy on Monday 3rd/10th October - £7 EOL only @ 19:30 - see BC website for more details.

JIF Monday Night Velodrome Session

JIF velodrome session starts on Monday 3rd October - 20:00 till 21:30 - members plus invited guests only - will run through to 19th March 2012 - please make use of this excellent facility, we need members to take advantage in order to make the session a success - cost will be based on numbers but is not going to be more than £5.

British National Track Championships

This coming weekend sees the running of the British National Track Championships at Manchester Velodrome and Courtney will be flying the flag for Cardiff JIF!  This is obviously a big step up in the level of competition and is excellent preparation for Courtney's goals at the World Masters Track Champs.  Good luck fella!