Text by Stuart Young, Photography by Mark Stewart and Alan Brown

Report from the Lead Car (so hopefully I got most of the facts right)

Sunday the 1st June saw the Scottish National Junior Road Race Championships return to Kennoway. A perfectly sunny day welcomed the riders to the race HQ, with just a breath of wind in the air, it was a great day to be out on the bike.

Around 50 riders, 29 of them juniors with the rest in the 3/4 Category support race, lined up just before 11am, and headed out of the village shortly after to start the 105km course. The route travelled 25km out to St Andrews, turning back towards Strathkinness and a 15km loop that was ridden three and a half times, before heading back towards Kennoway via Cults Hill and up Langside Brae to the finish.

Forsyth and Claxton working together on the road from St Andrews

It was not long before attacks started from the bunch, and soon a pair of riders had managed to break the elastic, Ben Forsyth (Spokes Racing Team) and Angus Claxton (East Sutherland Wheelers). Working well together, they pulled out a gap of over a minute, as the duo came onto the circuit. However, it was not to be for Claxton, during lap two he began to miss turns and eventually fell behind as Forsyth pressed on as they descended into Kemback for the second time.

 Despite now being alone, Forsyth still held onto the best part of a minute's lead ahead of the main bunch, but before long he was joined by Thomas Aitchison (Leslie Bikeshop/Bikers Boutique), a senior rider who had managed to break clear of the peloton as lap three began. However, after a few kilometres of this new pairing working together, the bunch had closed the gap and now had the escapees in their sight, no doubt threatened by Forsyth's presence up front. When the gap fell to less than 30 seconds, Forsyth eventually fell back into the clutches of the group after over 60km out front, but Aitchison wasn't ready to give up just yet, and surged again, leaving the bunch behind, who had perhaps relaxed slightly after getting the junior rider back in their grasp.

Aitchison was not hanging around, and as he left the circuit with less than 30km to ride, the gap had stretched out to over three minutes. At the turn onto Cults Hill it had increased further to 3:35 and things were looking promising for the Leslie Bikeshop/Bikers Boutique rider.

Thomas Aitchison alone up Cults Hill

However, things exploded into action on the climb, which in places ramped up to well over 15%, and by the time the riders had crested the hill and were onto the descent, a group had broken away from the main group and made the right turn onto Porter's Brae just thirty seconds behind Aitchison with just 10km to ride. As the support cars were pulled out of the rapidly shrinking gap, the new time difference was received by the lone rider and he tried to push on once more, and for the next 8km he only lost a few more seconds to the chasing pack, as he was able to pick his own lines through the narrow winding roads back towards Kennoway. The bunch experienced a few problems, with a couple of tight 90 degree left turns which resulted in a number of riders coming down.

Making the turn onto Langside Brae with just over 1km to go, Aitchison still held onto his slim lead, but as he started the climb up to the line, the bunch swept him up.

McInnes had time to soak up the glory

With just a few hundred metres remaining, the sprint started, and it was Straun McInnes (RST Racing Team) who ground his way ahead of the rest, crossing the line with arms aloft, just ahead of Stuart Balfour (Spokes Racing Team) and Sean Noon (Edinburgh RC). The leading senior was Peter Wakely (Edinburgh RC) in 7th place.

The sun was still shining as the presentation was made by local rider and last year's champion Mark Stewart, who has just been announced as a member of Scotland's Commonwealth Team.

Thanks go to Craig Grieve from Spokes Cycles, the organiser of the event, and to all the volunteers who helped make everything run so smoothly, there were actually more marshalls than riders attending this race!

Full Results:

Pos	No	Name		Team	Cat	Time
1	19	Struan	McInnes	RST Racing Team	2nd / Jun	02:51:18
2	2	Stuart	Balfour	Spokes Racing Team	2nd / Jun	1
3	24	Sean	Noon	Edinburgh RC	2nd / Jun	4
4	29	Ruari	Yeoman	East Kilbride Road Club	2nd / Jun	st
5	3	Andy	Brown	Glasgow Cycle Team	2nd / Jun	6
6	20	Rory	Mellis	Beste Alde	3rd / Jun	10
7	45	Peter	Wakely	Edinburgh RC	3rd	12
8	12	Rian	Hill	Classic Racing Team	3rd / Jun	17
9	37	John	Kermode	Spokes Racing Team	3rd	21
10	10	Lewis	Grieve	Spokes Racing Team	2nd / Jun	st
11	39	Keith	Laird	Team Thomsons Cycles	3rd	23
12	8	Ben	Forsyth	Spokes Racing Team	2nd / Jun	st
13	6	Rhys	Donnelly	Edinburgh RC	3rd / Jun	28
14	32	Neil	Anderson	Deeside Thistle CC	3rd	31
15	49	Jamie	Henderson	Spokes Racing Team	3rd	st
16	54	Richard	McGee	Glasgow Nightingale CC	3rd	38
17	18	Zak	Loney	Team LFH	2nd / Jun	st
18	31	Thomas	Aitchison	Leslie Bike Shop/Bikers Boutique	3rd	41
19	44	Wilco	Van Wijgerden	Cycloteam.com	3rd	st
20	40	Joseph	McMillan	Team Right Move Windows	3rd	44
21	1	Gavin	Alexander	Team Novo Nordisk	4th / Jun	46
22	27	Jordan	Stronach	Ythan CC	3rd / Jun	58
23	42	Gary	Paterson	Spokes Racing Team	4th	01:17
24	46	Andrew	Wilson	Falkirk Bicycle Club	3rd	01:29
25	21	Alistair	Merry	Discovery Junior Cycling Club	3rd / Jun	01:47
26	33	Andrew	Brierley	Leslie Bike Shop/Bikers Boutique	3rd	02:18
27	28	Francis	Webb	Edinburgh RC	3rd / Jun	02:24
28	5	Thomas	Deas	Moray Firth Cycling Club	4th / Jun	02:32
29	22	Calum	Mitchell	Spokes Racing Team	3rd / Jun	02:38
30	47	William	Turner	Falkirk Bicycle Club	4th	03:29
31	43	Ken	Thomson	Dunfermline CC	3rd	04:06
32	51	John	McCaffery	Leslie Bike Shop/Bikers Boutique	3rd	04:38
33	4	Angus	Claxton	East Sutherland Wheelers	3rd / Jun	06:42
34	13	Benjamin	Hindley	Peebles CC	4th / Jun	12:28
35	23	Lewis	Mulholland	Glasgow Cycle Team	3rd / Jun	12:32
36	16	Fraser	Knox	Glasgow Cycle Team		12:39
37	38	Martin	Knox	Glasgow Nightingale CC	3rd	12:43
38	41	Gabriella	Nordin	Pedal Power RT	2nd	13:42