Results and Reports for June 3-4

Great Britain

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North London Division Road Race

North London Division Road Race

Whitewell (Nr Hitchen) UK, June 4, 2000

Martin Ford wins North London Division Championship

This week there are no Premier Calendar or national series events due to the running of all the Division Championships throughout the UK. These are races open to all category of riders who are based in a particlar division. My team for example, Team Synergy is based in the North London Division and so all riders in the team, including a few UK based kiwis, ride that event.

In all, there are around (just in case my counting isn't up to scratch), 23 UK division races. On a normal weekend here in the UK where you would have a number of national series events contested by the best riders in that category (Premier-seniors, Women, Under 23s, Juniors and Veterans -over 40s) as well as a number of open events, when the division titles are held, there are many more races for Elite and cat 1 riders to ride which is why perhaps, these races can be easier than many open events for Elites and also why it would seem a number of the events do not have full fields.

The full field question could also be down to the distance as well as all the division races appear to be 130km or more. Not the sort of distance most category 3 or 4 riders would like I expect and also too far for many women and juniors. Looking at the distance of the Peter Fryer races (National Series), the distances are also perhaps too long for many "club" vets. To give you a flavour of the UK division title race though, here's my report. Please bear in mind I was having my legs ripped off for most of that race in an event run off at more than 40kp/h and where only 16 riders finished, so my memory is a bit vague but 3rd place Ben Powell (NZ/Team Synergy) helped me out.

I would also point out that in most divisions if not all, the races are for men. Perhaps there is not enough women for a division title but the same cannot be said for veterans, juniors and so on. Division titles for all categories (including Youth) should be available and ways of implementing such looked at. Off the soap box.

Which all leads to the fact that when I arrived to sign on for my division event, there were only approx 46 men pre entered. I had not pre entered (to busy with my web site!) and so got a ride, as did a number of others and with the weather being quite ideal for racing, there was I expect a field closer to 60 although I am only guessing.

Setting the scene, the weather for this part of the world, Whitwell near Hitchen (Hertfordshire), around 40 miles north of London, was supposed to be foul. Heavy rain and gales. That was the forecast which only this week, a program on the BBC was telling us that forecasts were a lot more accurate. Thankfully, they were not. Hardly a cloud in the sky and a strong wind blowing when I left home.

The circuit was 14km which had to be covered 10 times which meant 9 times up the main climb, a twisting 1 mile drag which has a short kick at the end. The race was being promoted by the Welwyn Wheelers based in Welywn Garden City that also boasts an outdoor velodrome. Hence in the race, a string of the Welwyn team, one of whom I came to know a lot during the race. The race also saw the Arctic 2000 team turn up with Martin Ford among their numbers. Martin is currently 11th in the Premier Calendar standings with five top 20 placings to his name. A "hitter if ever there was one" for a race like this.

Also in the field was Ben Powell from New Zealand, 8th in last weeks under 23 national series race and having taken him around the course midweek on a 5 hour plus ride, Ben was confident of doing well.

The race started quickly, with the average speed for the first lap a tad under 26 mph, and increasing to more than 26mph over the first three laps. This is where I and most of the field lost contact with nine riders who went off the front, with the driving forces being Arctic 2000 and Team Synergy's Ben Powell. The split happened on the long climb with Ben Powell telling me later that he responded to an attack by Arctic 2000 and nailed it up the last part of the climb and at the top, looked around to see only four riders with him. Another five joined later on.

This group of nine quickly made time on the peloton who were not working well together with riders attacking one another, creatng an atmostphere where sharing the work load was impossible because as soon as you did, an attack reduced the groups numbers.

Speaking of attacks, one of the most prominent early on was Aarron Philips from Team Synergy/New Zealand who got away in a small group on lap 1. Then, despite being dropped the first time up the main climb, attacked again as soon as he caught the group. Bravado!

I should also mention a crash which seemed to take down three or four riders three quarters of the way around the first lap, including my teammate, Graham Freestone-King who thankfully was unhurt except from some abrasions. All I got was a chase back to the group which was lined out after the crash.

At the front meanwhile, with more than half the race gone, and the group having been working well together for a number of laps, one of the Arctic 2000 riders apparently dropped back to the car for bottles and instructions and sure enough, with 3 riders in the break, they started to attack in turn.

With four laps to go, the group of nine was reduced to four with two Arctic riders along with Ben Powell and another. According to Ben, the eventual winner didn't appear that comfortable on the climbs while Bayley was riding very well on the ascents. With a lap and half to go, Ford attacked in what Ben describes as soft move.It was Ben's intention to keep the gap to a minimum to let him sit there, on parts of the course which twist and turn. However, once out of sight, Ford increased the 50 metre gap to more than a minute at which point Ben realised it was race over.

Despite the gap, and Bayley from Arctic riding sitting on his wheel while his teammmate was away up the road, Ben continued to attack. One of the attacks which he expected to get away with ended up a non-event when he pulled his foot from the pedals, something I saw a number of riders do.

The upshot was that Ben and another rider rotated on the chase until Ben attacked and went away with Bayley, towing him for 30km to the end. It was no surprise to Ben that he was rolled in the sprint and even after Bayley said sorry for rolling him, Ben was still miffed at the result.

All he had to show for his race was fifteen pounds and a third place medal. Winning would have been a different story. Afterwards Ben compared it to Centre races in New Zealand which are held over even longer distances for local riders. He said it was pretty similar to the centre races he has done in New Zealand, esepecially in Dunedin where there are many strong riders from national teams and so on.

Behind the lead groups, the peloton which I had hoped would stay together and provide me some vaulable training for an upcoming national series race, slowly fell apart, towards the end thanks to a series of searing attacks from Simon Layfield from the host club. With 3 laps to go, there were nine riders left chasing points for nine places. But Layfield attacked twice on the upper part of the main climb to reduce the numbers to four and then on the next lap, did the same and thankfully I was sure it would happend and so being prepared, made sure I hung on to that wheel and at the top, found we were alone. Some peloton!

In the end, for me it had been a valuable experience as it was the first division title race I had ridden. Good weather, testing course (Ben called it easy but he would!), well marshalled which included police escorts and in the end, I sit tapping this out with very sore legs. I'm sure that many of the division titles were more testing than this but Martin Ford was a worthy winner and I'm sure the backup from Arctic 2000 helped in that.

As you can see from the above result, the category system here in the UK doesn't stand for much. Lower cat riders can be a top rider in another discipline (ITT, MTB etc) and only be a lower category rider in road racing because they don't accumulate the points doing road racing on a casual basis.

Courtesy of Larry Hickmott at www.echelon-velo.co.uk

Results

1 Martin Ford (GBr) Arctic 2000           (Elite)
2 Tim Bayley (GBr) Arctic 2000            (Elite)
3 Ben Powell (NZl) Team Synergy           (Elite)
4 Will O'Callaghan (GBr) Marshalls        (1st cat)
5 Jake Folkerd-Hobbs (GBr) Finsbury 2000  (3rd Cat)
6 Steve Bendall (GBr) Arctic 2000         (Elite)
7 Nick Warren (GBr) Welwyn Wheelers       (3rd cat)
8 Mark Botteley (GBr) Letchworth Velo     (1st Cat)
9 Steve Cotton (GBr) Stevenage CC         (2nd cat)
10 Neil Lewis (GBr) North Road CC         (2nd Cat)
11 Paul Mongahan (GBr) Finsbury CC        (??)
12 Simon Layfield (GBr) Welwyn Wheelers   (1st Cat)
13 Larry Hickmott (GBr) Team Synergy      (1st Cat)
14 Hayden Groves (GBr) North Road CC      (2nd cat)
15 Tony Doyle (GBr) Marshalls             (??)
16 Colin Bailey (GBr) North Road CC       (3rd Cat)

16 finishers