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You can't drop that one in then walk away!
You are correct, I should really have kept silent about the whole thing. The problem was that publicising his talk would have undermined what the speaker was trying to do.
There is a maxim in the club:'What is said in the club stays within the club'. Recently this has been modified - 'except for Chris's reports'. So I have to be careful - it was careless of me to mention that meeting at all! In the golden age (that is, from when you yourself were very young and as far back as you like) 'Cycling', the magazine, carried regular reports of Pedal Club meetings. This was not altogether surprising since H.H. England, a long standing editor of the magazine, was an active and leading member of the club, and I think his influence continued long after his tenure ended. So when I try to reproduce the standard of those reports I am standing on the shoulders of a giant.
The point that interested me about the older riders was that while 10 years ago the biggest vets group was the 40-49 range, it has now become the 50 -59 group. This looks worryingly like what has happened in time trials.
You are right about young riders coming out of cyclo cross into other disciplines - I think Fred Wright is another example, as is Hope Inglis on the womens side. This is very encouraging, but it's not a new thing: Roger Hammond started in CX, and a certain Jean Robic also had his first big success in the discipline.
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clubman
You can't drop that one in then walk away!
As someone who has been racing LCCA events for the past 15 years, the growth in the number of competitors per league event has been very noticeable. Whilst a lot of older riders continue to race, we've seen an increase in the number of younger riders competing and have seen a number of them graduate to the World Tour. It looks like Joe Blackmore will be the next LCCA alumni to make this step.