Back to the Future?

I hate sounding like a grouch. My kids tell me I'm grumpy in the morning but I tell them it's nothing personal! The idea of taking my Hasselblad to a bike race wasn't really an act of defiance: that would be as futile as Canute and the waves. (of which more later). Nope. It has more to do with the fact that I want to enjoy every photoshoot I do and I really like the notion of using a tool that isn't really designed for the job. And, next to the 9 frames per second, autofocus, colour-metering, 16G card toting digital bodies and lenses of now, it is patently overfaced.  By the time I had pulled the magazine out of the back, wound off the film, opened a new roll and loaded it with wind-chilled fingers, the riders - my targets-had come and gone. More than once. But then I wasn't there to concentrate on any one man. No 'must get the winner' for me. Lovely.  All I had to worry my tiny mind about was nice images and the taking thereof. I had a plan for this event which was held at Rutland Water in the East Midlands. The course went along the shoreline at one point and I took a pair of chest waders thinking I would get into the deeper water and shoot at water level back onto the shore. Well, a lack of water and a re-routed course put paid to that, but I did wade out in my wellies to attempt the shot. I think I nailed too. But not before a freak wave washed a gallon of freezing snow melt water down into my socks. And that right at the start of the race! Rather than look for the obvious: head on easy AF shots where the focus points pick up the subject and you can pop off a sequence and pick the best one later, I was forced to plan. To chose very carefully. Pre-focusing and timing. Getting used to a waist level finder: hey those guys are coming from the wrong direction! But it was a very pleasant day out. Now there is the excitement of sending the rolls off to the lab and waiting to see what I have got. No chimping today.
See, I don't like to think of myself as a retrogrouch, but if you don't challenge yourself every now and again what's the point?

Footnote: more strangers completed my camera than when I swing the Nikon DSLRs around!