BSCC is a year-round cycling club that provides safe and challenging events - road, track, criterium, and MTB - in the Ballarat region.  Traditionally, the club's emphasis has been on road and track racing.  Recently, especially since 2009, we are branching out to include a wider variety of events, not all of them races.  Please click HERE for information about recreational road rides, and HERE for information about other regular group road rides.  Track racing info is HERE, and info about MTB events - not all races - is HERE.  The rest of this page is about road racing. 

All riders, BSCC members or not, are always very welcome at all BSCC events.  Generally speaking, the more riders there are in a race, the more interesting the race is, to watch and to do, so come one, come all!  If you're in town, or passing through, and one of our races takes your fancy, please come along, whether or not you're a member of a cycling club.  As we explain below, we cater for a wide range of abilities.  For some of our races, we ask for entries a few days ahead, but even this rule will be waived if you ask nicely.  The only firm requirement is that you hold the appropriate Cycling Australia license.  This rule exists for all Cycling Australia-sanctioned events in Australia, and it's to make sure you have the appropriate insurance, in case of an accident to you or to another competitor or official.  License options are explained HERE. 

To see our current downloadable road racing fixture, please go to the on-line calendar, and you'll see the fixture at the top of the page.  Our road racing season typically commences in March and ends in November, and includes graded scratch races and handicap races for senior and junior riders.  (If you're new to cycling, you might not be familiar with some of the terminology here.  The words in italics are defied at the bottom of this page.)  Our seniors generally race over distances between 50 km and 65 km.  Junior races are shorter: distances vary according to the circuit, conditions and entrant numbers and skill.  Race locations include Glen Park, Dunnstown, Snake Valley and other localities within riding distance of Ballarat.  Go to the on-line calendar and click on any of the "RR" entries, and you'll see a link to a map of the race circuit.  We aim to provide our participants with a variety of courses, including flat and fast circuits, out and back or loop courses, and the occassional hilly race.  The definition of a hilly circuit in Ballarat is not the same as in Bright, or the Rockies, or many other places.  But Ballarat road racing has been described by someone who knows as "the hard rider's paradise."  You can always count on it being windy!

The club works with the Geelong and Colac Cycling Clubs to present the 'Tri Series', a race series across locations in each of the club areas.  Recently these events have been held in the middle of the season.  At these events, participants compete in a graded scratch race against riders from the other clubs, and although individual prizes are awarded, it is a club event so each club is allocated points towards the overall series prize.

The club holds an annual road race championship in Gordon in September-October. This race is the premier event for the year.  It's our only race that is only open to BSCC members.  Here's a report on the 2009 championship. 

Our 'blue ribbon' events are The Collier, which is a prestigious handicap at Kingston over 85km, named for our club life member and patron, John Collier; The Brookman, a 60 km handicap, named for a former club member who tragically died while riding his bike on national service; club time trial championships on the famed Cuthberts Road circuit, and the Buninyong Hill Climb, which rewards our best climbers.  Click on the links for reports on recent editions of these events. 

All BSCC road races cost $5 for senior members and a few dollars for junior members.  Start times are on the on-line calendar - typically 2 PM for Saturday races, and 10 AM on Sundays.  The Tri Series races cost $10 and attract prize money.  BSCC is a not-for-profit club, so most race fees are invested in the club's various programs, facilities and functions, to ensure our club is financially viable into the future.  That's a long way of saying you won't get rich winning BSCC club races. 

All road races are conducted with permission of Victoria Police, the relevant council and VicRoads, are managed in accordance with Event Management Plans prepared by the club, and underwritten by our insurers. The club works hard to ensure that our races are conducted in the safest possible manner to protect our riders.

Small Dog criteriums

During the daylight savings months, from late October to late March, the club holds its weekly Small Dog Criterium races - so named for our major sponsor, Small Dog Design - on a closed circuit in Victoria Park in central Ballarat. The circuit is sealed, wide and about 1.1 km in length, with fast sweeping bends and a tight hairpin at the top of the straight.

We have racing for all ages of juniors, from mini midgets to under 17's, girls and boys, and we run several formats depending on numbers and entrant skills and abilities.
It's always fun and flexible, and focussed towards participation, socialising and fun.

For the seniors we run at least three grades, A, B and C. A and B grade race for at least 20 mins plus 2 laps, but often up to 30 mins plus 2 depending on who is in charge and how much they want us to suffer! C grade is no less than 20 mins plus 2 laps. The top three in each race get points towards the annual aggregate award. From time to time we award prizemoney, but these are for special events only and not a weekly occurence. Male and female riders race together across all junior and senior events, and we encourage as many new and existing women riders to check out our racing scene and get involved!

The criterium season culminates in senior and junior championship races in March. For the seniors, this race is typically an 'all in' affair - all grades racing together - with one overall winner and minor places awarded. Junior races are structured differently across ages and abilities.

Racing typically commences at 5 PM for junior events, with seniors typically starting at 6 PM, but always check the calendar. Racing costs $5 for seniors and only a few dollars for juniors.

All criterium races are conducted with permission of Victoria Police, City of Ballarat and VicRoads, are managed in accordance with Event Management Plans prepared by the club, and underwritten by our insurers. Also, the circuit is always car-free. Again, the club's focus is on safety first, which ensures our criterium races are conducted in the safest possible manner to protect our riders.

Terminology

Scratch races are what everyone else in the world outside Australia calls races! Everyone starts together, and first across the line wins. We have a wide range of abilities in the club - from elite riders who train 20 or more hours a week, have raced in Europe, race 60 or more days per year, and ride the National Race Series, to people who ride a few times a week and are doing their first race.  Most of us are in between.  To accommodate these abilities, we split our scratch races into grades - typically A, B, C and sometimes D in seniors - so that you're racing against people of similar ability.  In a typical club race, we might have 40 senior entries, so three grades of 12-15 riders each.  We usually have enough riders in each grade to make it a decent race, but not so many that riders unused to ProTour-sized fields (typically 200) will be spooked.  Each grade starts separately.  If the race is on a circuit, C grade might do fewer laps than A or B. 

Handicap races are a uniquely Australian solution to the same problem.The entire field is divided into groups of roughly equal ability.  For example our typical field of 40 might be split into eight groups of about 5 each.  All the groups ride the same course, but the slowest group (so-called "limit") starts first, then a few minutes later the second-slowest ("second limit"), and so on, and the really fast ones - the so-called "scratch" group - start last.  The groups are also sometimes referred to by the head-start they have on scratch.  For example in a 50-km club handicap, the limit bunch might also be the 22-minute bunch, meaning that they start 22 minutes in front of the long-suffering scratch riders.  The tactics in handicap races are very simple: each group works together as efficiently as possible, taking turns at the front, until they catch all the others, or are caught themselves.  Then the tactical racing starts, with everyone theoretically reduced to the same level by the handicaps.  Needless to say, it all depends on the handicapper reading the tea-leaves accurately regarding riders' relative form.  The Melbourne to Ballarat is an example of a handicap race that has been running for a century.