In reply to Jurgan C:
What I did was:
Select a spot with the sun behind - lit the subjets nicely.
Used a low angle, i.e. sat on my bum (take a small cushion).
Used my knee as an ad-hoc monopod (this helps eliminate vertical movement), a proper monopod would have been better as I could have set it to the height I wanted (one thing to worry about).
Worked out where I was going to get the better shots along this section, tracked the incoming cyclists and fired away in sport mode just before they got to the sweet spot and kept going until they were out of. As the day wore on I found I was using this less and firing off one to two shots once got the hang of it.
I used spot focus in servo (continuosly adjusting) mode.