Introducing...
Every month, we aim to introduce some of the Kingston Wheelers and Rob Sharland is here for December 2011. He swapped pizza for malt loaf and only started riding regularly this year. He decided to race and soon won at Hillingdon and move from fourth to third category. Then he won his first race as a third cat.
Photo: Velo UK
Name: Rob Sharland
Age: 24
Any significant others? Lucy (cycling widow of late!)
When did you join the club? May 2011.
Why did you join the Kingston Wheelers? I joined Kingston Wheeler's as a mate of mine (Sam Batley) was a member and was getting into road cycling in a big way. I've always been a cycling fan of sorts, and with the opportunity to do the cycle-to-work scheme I thought I would get myself a road bike, and go out with Sam and the club to see how I got on, it was mainly a fitness thing, and at the time I was also single so had plenty of time on my hands and cycling certainly seemed more appealing than lounging around eating pizza!
What made you start cycling? I cycled as a youth, mainly because I lived utterly in the middle of nowhere and the only way to get out and about was to get on the bike. In those days I was into dirt jumping and 'freeride' which really was finding the largest drops I could find and riding my bike off them. But road cycling was really an appeal when I landed a job at a company four miles from home, it was too far to walk, and annoyingly took an hour to reach on the bus, so the daily cycling began there.
What bike do you ride? I currently ride a Ribble Sportive Racing, it again was a heavily tax incentivised bike, and I must say, bar the odd creak its been very good. I've handed down quite a beating to it, I've had it since May and I estimate its done probably in the region of 5-6 thousand miles. Before that I had a BMC which was lovely if not a little heavy. And as a freind said, "nice bikes if you can live with riding a gate"...
Give us a brief cycling background: I rode as a youngster, probably did 50-100 miles a week of riding that was a mix up of riding to mates houses (all about 10 miles away) and going out jumping at the weekends. Fast forward 5 years, and 4 stone I was doing nothing, I then started commuting to work 4 miles each way, I joined the club at this point having ridden a maximum of 30 miles beforehand. I then moved job again, and had a 11 mile commute each way, this is when the weight started coming off. I also got a bit more serious with my riding and started going on longer runs, and also joined the Tuesday chaingang ride, this was instrumental in my move to racing this winter. Since then I've moved jobs again and now do an 18 mile each way commute three or four times a week, I've lost over three stone and am now just about able to stick with the faster riders in the club (as long as it's flat)! And 3 weeks ago I did my first race!
What was your best performance or ride? My best performance is an easy one to answer, it was last week at Hillingdon. After doing the 4th Cat race the previous week and winning it, I repeated this success with the 3rd Cat race and won that too, albeit by six inches!
What was your worst day on the bike? My worst day on the bike was also my first big ride, me and Sam set up my brand new BMC, and set out to do the flat Windsor loop, we got to the cafe stop in the park without issue, then the hell began. I came back to my bike after a tea to find the tyre flat, annoying, but not rare I thought, so we popped another tube in and off we went. By the time we got to the exit gate of the park I was flat again, so we used Sam's gas pump to fill another tube and set off again, as you can guess ten minutes later it was flat again (not just the same wheel either) and this happened seven times in total before we called it a day and got the train from Shepperton to Kingston where I promptly marched into Sigma and bought the heaviest winter tyres known to man.
Who is your favourite pro or inspiration? Being a fairly new convert to road cycling and fairly young I can't really claim to have Sean Kelly or Eddy Mercx or similar as inspirations, because they were really before my time. Riders I admire for different reason include Mark Cavendish, mainly for his 2010 Sprint at the final stage of the TDF - Awesome. I'm also a huge Fabian Cancellara fan, a pwoerhouse of a man, and with him riding the classics there's never a dull moment, I've lost count of the amount of times I've watched the video of him going past Brad Wiggins probably at 5mph faster, quite a feat given Bradley Wiggins pace!
What is your favourite bike food? Soreen Maltloaf, cheap, tasty, and doesn't mind being shoved in a jersey!
Where is your favourite cycling location? I'm a big fan of the roads around Henley, rolling and flat. That said I do love a jaunt into the Surrey Hills, and on a clear day not much can beat the view off Box Hill, as cliche as that sounds.
Most likely to say: "Thanks for the tow Jim/Steve/Alex"
Least likely to say: "Hurry up Alex you're holding us up back here.".
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