Even though I raced years ago, I made some classic newbie mistakes at last Thurday's race; the 2nd in my "comeback".

I rode A grade vets (probably a mistake to begin with), and for the first 15 minutes I thought they were all slow coz they were just cruizin around at about 40kmh. I actually thought, "jee, I can win this -- all I have to do is control the breaks and attack near the end". So, early on, i chased down 3 breaks on my own like a big fat stooopid hero, with the whole bunch behind me, and I was still thinking everything was '***** dory', sitting up the front keeping the pace up. BIG MISTAKE!!!!

After about 20mins, the REAL riders started to attack, and the pace picked RIGHT up, with attack after attack, and they were sprinting hard out of the slow corners!!

Anyway, after 45mins I blew up and dropped out . Won't be making the same mistakes again.

I think it was the sprinting out of the corners that killed me in the end -- there's a big difference between grinding along Beach Road and sprinting again and again in a criterium!! D'OH, I should've known