The morning got underway with a race for 4th cats and they were shortly followed by the women. The men were to do 13 laps and the women 12. There were 25 men and 12 women with a minute gap between them.
The races was fairly unexciting with the men attacking for most of the race but all attempts came to nothing as they were pulled back quickly. With just over a lap to go the rain started to fall quite heavily and both races finished in the rain. The women rode around in a bunch until the last few hundred meters and the men's race only opened up with about 500m to go.
The race for the 3rd cats was held entirely in heavy rain, while several attacks were made these were also pulled back. Several times a small group of about five riders got a few seconds but again they were pulled back. With a couple of laps to go the main break of the race was made and a group of seven riders pulled enough of a gap to stay away. With 200 meters to go Mark Mazewski (Bayeux Landscapes) pulled away to take the win by a few meters.
With the rain still falling quite heavily the E12 race got underway; they were set on their way on the first of 21 laps. On the first lap five riders pulled out a lead of 30 seconds but by time they keep back around the bunch were all together again. For several laps a few riders attacked pulled others across with them but none of these were to stick.
At the five laps completed stage, five riders pulled away and held a forty second gap but again this came to no avail. As the race completed the nine lap mark the race deciding break went away, and it was a strong group of five that made it. The five riders to get away were Simon Brookes (VC St Raphael), Paul Pickup and Andres Christensen (Cycle Kingdom), Felix English (Science in Sport) and Brock Duncombe-Rogers (Progressive Cycle Coach).
With six laps to go the lead group had a gap of 26 seconds, this gap went out to 40 seconds. The bunch was trying to pull this back and the gap dropped to 26 seconds. Then with three laps to go the leaders extended this lead to over 50 seconds with a hard charge and this was the race deciding move. At the bell Brock had dropped off the lead and he was hanging in no man's land between the leaders and the chasing bunch, he was 24 seconds behind the leaders with the bunch at a further one minute eight seconds back.
With just the length of the finish straight to go it was Felix who pulled away from Andres with Paul out sprinting Simon for third.
Results
4th Cats
1. Mark Newnham Worthing Excelsior 1:23:00
2. Alan Thew i-Team.cc
3. Ryan Visor Redhill CC
4. Matthew Butt Brighton Mitre
5. Martin Green Bayeux Landscapes
Women
1. Lauren Whitmore London Dynamo 1:21:00
2. Lynn Frampton Crawley Tri Club
3. Claire Leonard Brighton Mitre
4. Fiona Blagg Crawley Tri Club
5. Jo Perry San Fairy Ann CC
3rd Cats
1. Mark Markowski Bayeux Landscapes 01:42:00
2. Darryl Rice Southdown Velo @st
3. Andy Lack Kingston Wheelers @ 0:04
4. Ian Jones Bayeux Landscapes @ 0:08 5
5. Andy Shackel i-Team.cc @ 0:13
E12
1. Felix English Science in Sport 1hr 52min 12secs
2. Andres Christensen Cycle Kingdom @12secs
3. Paul Pickup Cycle Kingdom
4. Simon Brookes VC St Raphael
5. Brock Duncombe-Rogers Progressive Cycle Coaching Development Squad @1min 16secs
6. Toby Neave Cannondale Racing @ 1:31
British Cycling would like to thank the organising team, officials and everyone else who helped promote this event. Our sport could not exist without the hundreds of people, many of them unpaid volunteers, who put in many hours of hard work running events, activities and clubs.
