Headed up to the Road Nationals in Wanganui on Friday and stayed with Craig Lawn in a small cottage very close to the race circuit.
Didn't arrive until about 8pm (the night before the race) and Lawny was just tucking into a large ice cream.
Lawny has the best pre-race diet of anyone I know. It's either a large takeaway pizza or a family meal from Burger King. He washes this down with 4 RTD's (pre-mixed alcoholic drinks) and a big ice cream for dessert.
Meanwhile, I had my tuna calzone with mineral water and a power bar for dessert. Lawny says it's been his pre-race meal routine for years and he doesn't like to deviate from it.
It definitely works - he won the race!
Lawny went up the road by himself halfway through lap 2 (4 laps total), I bridged up to him on the main climb and after taking a big pause to recover we got into our familiar 2 man TT formation.
A group of 4 bridged up to us on the 3rd lap - we dropped all bar one on the next climb. Last lap - the wheels were starting to fall off (started feeling the early signs of cramp). Encouraged by the 2:58 time check we pushed on.
Our break away companion (Ben) was soft pedalling when coming through for turns throughout most of the race. So, approaching the finish, I had a word to Lawny and we decided to leave Ben on the front from about a 1km out.
I positioned myself onto Ben's wheel, Lawny sitting on the back. 200m out and Lawny jumped... went after him and finished 2nd! Really happy with the result and Lawny was chuffed with the win.
Tribute video to Lawny courtesy of Dan Warren below.
Posts
