I felt a bit of pity for those A graders when Pete "The Machine" McDonald in an all to familiar attack pose (left), wound up the wick only a couple of laps into the race.  Jenny and I had to have double takes on our stop watches as we realised Pete was lapping in 2 min 33's.  That equates to 48 kph average.  It didn't take long for A grade to be blown apart with only 2 riders able to stay with Pete, Brent Jenkins and Nick Rathbourne.

Pain showed on the faces of the chasing A grade peloton as their lungs and legs screamed for mercy to maintain the pace.  The look of pain so evident on the face of Paddy Jones left, but that's how Paddy likes it.

As for Jeff "The Doc" Jones, I'm not sure if the look was pain or fear.  Perhaps a little of both as his body screamed for mercy at the unholy pace.  Although a little bit of the pain may well have been self inflicted as my spies informed me that the Doc had engaged in a little more Christmas cheer this week than he did training. 

Well "The Machine" threw everything at them and just as he thought he had cracked them after a big turn, he rolled off and was suddenly 10 metres off the back as new RBCC member, Brent Jenkins dropped the hammer, as if to say "Is that all you have Pete?"  The Machine was able to claw back on and the three  then stayed together till the end.  Poor Tony was unable to take a photo of Nick as he was dug in like a tick.  One thing you can say about Concey (Frank Conceicao) he really teaches his boys how to "Suck Wheel"

Meanwhile back at the A grade peloton, the lads eventually settled back to a sane pace and worked well together after they realised that they would need Kev Black's Ducati to get them across the gap to the 3 escapees.

We soon learned that not only has Brent got a big engine but he can sprint as well.  Nick Rathbourne who has a great sprint must have thought that he had it in the bag till Brent timed his run perfectly to come up alongside Nick and take him by about quarter wheel.  Pete "The Machine" got to watch the 2 titans go head to head and cruised in for third.  We must tell Tony to click the camera BEFORE the line.

I know I have given A grade about half the report but I had to include this great photo of Brent and Peter. Both looked so relaxed at the incredible pace they were doing.  Brent you are doing ok if you can absorb all that the recent Grafton to Inverell classic winner and more recently The Tour of Bright winner, threw at you. 

Well finally to B grade.  Here's a photo of the boys on the line.  I had to have a second look at it to see if it was at Heffron or the start of one of our "Coffee Rides".  Now once upon a time, a Colnago used to be a bit of a status symbol but in this bunch it is just run of the mill.  C50's were things you used to drool over in magazines but there were at least 3 in this grade and 2 in this photo. By the way Colnago is a sponsor of our club via the distributor Excelpro. 

Left B grade action and in centre of photo, Andy "The Colonel" Hall looks pretty comfortable on his new baby (brand new C50 Colnago) on her first outing.  Now that is the definition of "Trust".  Throwing your one day old $11 thousand dollar machine in the midst of these fellow B graders.  Well I will call it trust anyway.

More B grade action with Rocky "Heart of Pharlap" Fortuna looking very frustrated.  You can almost hear him saying, "Come on lift the pace or let me at the front" 

Left Sean O'Neill,  doing what he likes to do best and that is hurting himself.  Here he is left having a hit off the front of B and enjoying the pain.

It's about this time of the year, that you have to watch out for Shaun Ballesty in C grade.  Shaun manages to get a bit more riding in than his usual 2 rides a week and suddenly starts to hit form.  This week he was up on the podium with a fine 3rd place. 

The D grade escape bunch with big Paul Dimitriou driving it along.  It is pretty evident that the exact point of the race at the time of Tony's photo was "Two laps to go". 

The E grade bunch with the girls, new member Sylvia Yuen and Rosanna Fortuna out the front doing the work.  We have to do something about the "Ringins" in this grade.  Check out the two "E graders" hiding down the back far left.