Lovelo-Cinelli stepped in to run this year’s National Masters Champs with only a couple of months to spare – and pulled off one of the best-organised races of the season. Read all about it and see more photos here
Team Wiggins Women
Tour de France winner Bradley Wiggins says he plans to have a U23 women’s team running alongside the Team Wiggins U23 men’s squad by 2018. Wiggins, whose daughter Isabella is currently racing in U12 events, has some history backing women’s cycling – his Bradley Wiggins Foundation supported the Wiggle-Honda (now Wiggle-High5) team in the past. – more from Cycling Weekly
New October race for Birmingham
By October, we’ve usually seen the end of the road racing season and into ‘cross season (see “Recommended Races,” below). This year, though, there’s a new women’s race taking place on the first in Birmingham Business Park – it’s open to women in the 2nd, 3rd and 4th categories for a reasonable £12 and lasts for one hour. The circuit is one mile in length with only around two metres height gain on each lap, making it a sort of longer-than-average crit.
“The main reason I’m putting on the race, and the reason I have become an organiser is the fact, is that racing is getting very expensive, meaning some riders cannot afford to race,” says organiser Luke Selibas. “But also, I want to put on a high quality race, on a safe course where the women don’t have to race with male riders, which often ends up becoming who can hold onto the men instead of a race against each other, if that makes sense.”
Luke adds that as the business park is privately owned, the location will be “extremely quiet”- except for plenty of cheering fans, hopefully. Prizes are £30 for the winner, £20 for second, £10 for third with another tenner for the winning junior in each race, and the race offers Band 5 points. More info
New TT records
Super Simmonds! (© Gary Main)
The last month has seen a bumper harvest of for time trial records: Ford Ecoboost’s Henrietta Colborne set a new 10-mile Junior record of 20’21” at Team Jadan-Weldtite’s event on the V718 course near Kingston upon Hull – taking 58″ off her previous personal best in the process. Colborne, who had recently returned from racing at the BeNe Ladies’ Tour in Belgium and the Netherlands, had come very close to setting a record for her age group on the V718 before, but missed it due to a mechanical.
The event took place just one week after National Champion Hayley Simmonds smashed the 50-mile record by an incredible 4’26”; she was also at the event and with the course well known as a fast one all eyes were on her to see if the senior record might fall, despite a strong headwind on the return leg of the course. Nevertheless, the Cambridge-based rider didn’t disappoint with a time of 19’31”, 15″ faster than the previous record she set on this very same course a year ago.
That’s plenty for one rider in a week, right? Not Simmonds – on Sunday, riding the R25/3h course for the Bynea CC 25, she not only broke the record with her time of 49’28” but was also the first female to crack 50′, which boded well for the National 25-mile Championships the following weekend. However, the A1 course at Sawtry in Cambridgeshire is known to be fairly slow, meaning that while Simmonds was able to successfully defend her title she was far off her own record for the distance with 54’57”. Anna Turvey (Tyneside Vagabonds was second), Claire Rose (Podium Ambition) third, and Colborne was the winning junior with 1h00’29”.
Recommended Races
There’ve already been a few hill climbs, which means the 2016 season is starting to wind down (I know, feels like a few weeks since it started doesn’t it?) – but don’t worry, we still have a good few road races to go before everyone battles the big spiders at the back of the shed and retrieves their cyclocross bikes.
Saturday
BC West Thames 20, at the Hillingon Circuit, has a good selection of riders across its U8/10/12/14/16 and E/1/2/3/4 Women’s races – including Team Milton Keynes’ Michelle Lee, who seriously impressed at the National Master’s Championships a fortnight ago and looked certain to win before an incredible effort by Chanel Mason of the Army Cycling Union left her in second place. More riders entering on the day is very likely, too. More info
Round 5 of the Herne Hill Track League has just a handful of riders signed up, but there’ll be plenty more on the night – there always is. And what’s more, there are few more pleasant places for fans to enjoy a summer Saturday night in South London… take a bottle or three of wine, some deckchairs and enjoy. More info
North of the Thames, Lee Valley Velodrome plays host to the National Derny Championships. More info
Sunday
The CC Sudbury RR was one of the highlights of 2015 – this year, it could be even better
Last year’s first ever CC Sudbury Women’s RR was, by any standards, a remarkable race – the club decided it would be a good thing to do to organise a women’s race because they wanted to do their bit to support women’s cycling, and said they were willing to run it at a loss if only a few riders signed up. And then they got a full field, and everyone loved the Bulmer circuit, and it was one of the highlights of the season. So this year, the event is also serving as the FIRST EVER Eastern Region Women’s Championships! Among the riders already signed up are Sian Botteley and Tanya Griffiths of Starley Racing, Mel Brand of Ford Ecoboost, Isla Rush of Matrix Fitness, Ellie Cadzow and Sophia Chastell of Kinetic-Welwyn, Charlotte Colclough of Jadan-Weldtite, new National Masters Champion Chanel Mason of the Army Cycling Union, Keira McVitty of WNT and Jen George and Laura George of Drops. This is going to be a superb race; NS wouldn’t miss it for anything and with the legendary Biking Belles GP cancelled for this year, it’s the place for women’s cycling fans to be this weekend and so neither should you. More info
The Ellon Town Center Youth Criterium looks set to be the best youth racing this weekend, perhaps even this month now that the Tickhill GP has come to what is hopefully a temporary end. More info
There’s only one rider (Fiona Redding; Radeon-Bike Science) signed up for the first round of Behind The Bikeshed’s Odd Down Circuit Series near Bath, but with a healthy women’s cycling scene in the region more riders on the day are likely – and there’s plenty in the men’s races to keep you amused if not. More info
Blogs
Everyone knows that if you want to ride in the toughest races of all, Flanders is the place to go looking for them. So that’s where Matrix Fitness junior Isla Rush has been for the last few weeks…
“I am currently a first year junior, so I can do either junior and youth combined races (Dames Jeugd) , or the women’s races (Dames Elite) as long as there are no junior races on the same day. I did mixture of events as I wanted to get in as much racing as possible and challenge myself….” – Isla the Cyclist
Gabriella Nordin of Starley Racing has long been a favourite of NS. Here she tells us about her iris coloboma, and why it hasn’t stopped her cycling…
“I started racing a bit sporadically in 2012 and did my first full season in 2013. When I was a novice cyclist one thing my fellow training partners noticed was that I struggled with group riding etiquette. ‘Gabriella is very strong but doesn’t seem to grasp riding in a group’ and ‘She doesn’t always point out potholes’ were typical comments made. I had no idea why I was finding riding in a group so difficult when others seemed to pick it up very quickly. It was pretty disheartening. I loved bike racing but my future in the sport looked uncertain…” Gabriella Nordin
Karen Poole of Sports Test RT is about to start the Haute Route, and promises blog updates every day…
“Well, here I am. 3 months to the day since I was in an operating theatre at James Cook Hospital having my collarbone plated. Chilling out in a hotel in Bayonne near Biarritz, with my Haute Route adventure starting at 7:30 tomorrow morning. Given the circumstances, I couldn’t wish or expect to be any better prepared…” – Sports Test RT
Interesting Links
Welwyn Wheelers junior riders interviewed on Sky News
Nicole Oh wins at Crystal Palace – video
“Stolen Goat report women’s cycling picking up speed” – BikeBiz
John Chastell’s brief report on Kinetic-Welwyn at the Junior Series in Scarborough