Great Britain’s women para-cyclists were a force to be reckoned with at the UCI C1 Brixia Para-cycling Cup in Italy.
The event, which took place in Brescia from 1-3 May in Brescia, saw Sally Hurst, Liz Saul and Hannah Dines dominate the time-trial and road races in their respective categories, the highlight of a strong team performance that bodes well for the forthcoming UCI Para-cycling Road World Cup in Maniago from 5-7 June.
Sally Hurst beat Serbia’s Danijela Jovanovic against the clock and head-to-head to seal overall victory in the C2 class, a feat matched by Liz Saul riding in the C4 category.
Hannah Dines was equally in control on the trike in the T2 class, winning both the TT and road race against Argentina’s Cristina Otero.
Time trial world champion Lora Turnham was back in competition with Lauryn Therin for the first time since the para-cycling track world championships, taking the win in the time trial and second in the road race behind Spain’s Josefa Guzman Benitez and Judit Masdeu Cort.
Jen Browning was third in both of her events in the H3 hand bike class, while Hannah Hunt and Caroline Wareing represented Great Britain in H4. Hunt was third in the TT and fifth in the road race, while Wareing took fourth in both events.
There were strong performances in the men’s events with Simon Price’s brace of second places in the C2 class the highlight.
Brian Alldis’ third in the H4 time trial rounded out the podiums for Great Britain, a team performance that pleased Great Britain Para-cycling Team road manager Paul Dring following a strong showing at the previous weekend’s Verola Para-cycling Cup.
“It's been a valuable two weekends of racing and has given us the opportunity to see where some of the riders are after a big winter of training, whilst also picking up some important qualification points for Rio,” said Dring.
“It was great to see riders back up some solid performances in Verolanuova with further improvements this weekend in Brescia.
“Our experienced riders delivered some strong performances against world class opposition and some of the development team have pushed their name forward for potential selection for further international races in the summer.”
“We can take a lot of positives from this couple of weeks of racing,” Dring continued. “But more importantly we know where we need to go away and make further improvements as we continue to build to a crucial couple of weeks of world cup racing in June.”
Results
