Sunday 7th June 2009

From 11.00am onwards racing from Go-Race Youths A/B/C/D/E Senior/Junior/Women E/1/2 & 3/4 plus round of BC National Disability Series

On Sunday 7th June Salt Ayre Cycling Association held their “Day of Cycling” on the Luneside circuit. With sponsorship from Leisure Lakes Bikes.com and Science-in-Sport and with support from the Lancaster City Council Cycle Demonstration City Project, racing was provided for every category of rider through the day long programme.

First event of the day was a ‘GoRace’ for novice youths without licences but wanting to try bunch racing. With ages ranging from 8 to 12 the judges decided a two part formula was most fair and ran a 2 lap scratch race which was won by Salt Ayre Cog Set rider John Didsbury, followed by a 2 lap handicap which was won by Olivia Baybrooke of Eastlands Velo.
Next came the 15 minute plus 3 lap race for licensed youths in the under 12, 10 and 8 categories. With the organisers trying to handle the large numbers of “On the day” entries it was a very large field that contested the event giving the judges a bit of a headache but after a good competitive race Fabian Brennan (Cog Set) was declared under 12 boys winner, Hannah Jackson (Cog Set) under 12 girls winner, Andrew Hathaway (Bolton Hotwheels) under 10 boys winner, India Brennan (Cog Set) under 10 girls winner, Jonny Bouch (Border City Whls) under 8 boys winner and Chloe Loftus (Cog Set) under 8 girls winner.

The following under 16 and under 14’s race had a slightly smaller field but was equally competitive and run off at a fierce pace. At the end of 30 minutes and 3 laps it came down to a bunch sprint between the under 16 boys with Matthew Wallis (Ribble Valley Juniors) coming out on top. Some of the under 14 boys had stayed in with the older boys and Jack Sadler (Wheelbase) was clear winner of his category. Although not managing to hang onto the bunch of boys, Lydia Kirkwood (Eastlands Velo) rode very well in her first taste of massed start to win the under 16 girls category whilst Clare Gore did an equally strong ride to be best of the under 14 girls.
Over the lunch break whilst Salt Ayre Cog Set provided some excellent refreshments, Lancaster City Council took over use of the track to run some “Come and Try It” time trials. The excellent weather had brought out a good crowd of spectators and several took up the offer to try their wheels round the race circuit.

In the afternoon the main event of the day was Round 1 of the National Para-Cycling Circuit Series. Twenty para-cyclists competed with various disabilities and on a variety of machines from modified road bikes to full recumbent hand cycles with factors to determine the number of laps each covered fixed by National Co-ordinator, Phil Godfrey of British Cycling who was on hand to start the riders. First off was female hand cyclist Karen Darke who had travelled from Inverness for the event shortly after returning from training in Italy. As each of the competitors was sent off to cover their designated number of laps groups soon formed until the last off, partially sighted Sophie Thornhill on a tandem piloted by Phil Baybrooke, joined the fray for an hour of hard racing. The factors proved very accurate as Rob Wickham on a handcycle with 20 laps to cover caught Karen Darke on the last of her 16 laps and won by just four seconds. Meanwhile Tim Challinor and Shaun McKeown on standard bicycles had worked their way through the field together until Tim dropped Shaun on the last lap to take third.

The final event of the day was a race for senior and junior 3rd and 4th category riders and a good sized field lined up for the one hour plus 5 lap race which saw some attacking riding which saw Sam Jackson (Cleveleys RC) rewarded with a clear win from Dan McParland (Unattached) whilst the Sport City Velo trio of junior track riders Chris Latham, Julian Pearson and Joshua Gibson led in the bunch to finish third, fourth and fifth.
The day concluded with a prize presentation by Leisure Lakes Bikes.com manager Colin Gardner and event organiser Nev Pearson with all the youth riders go home with a goody bag from the sponsors and a good prize list distributed amongst the winners. The organisers and riders owe thanks to event commisaires Tony Sweeney and Gordon Helme, chief marshal Glenys Ferguson and her team of Neil Stirling and Anne Nicholson and the Cog Set parents for making the day possible.