Wednesday evening at Aldersley Stadium saw the Wheelers Annual Roller Championship AKA as the ‘Race to Nowhere’. Normally held earlier in the year, the date was delayed until a substitute set of competition rollers could be found whilst the clubs equipment was refurbished.
With last years Youth and Senior Champions not available to defend their titles, the door was open for new names to make their presence felt.
Youth
The youth races saw a wide age range from under 6 to under 16 year old, girls and boys vying for the honours.
After the first round where each rider was timed over a 250m flying start it was under 14’s rider Grace Lister who held top spot with 10.72 seconds.
Going into the second round over 500M, Grace held 1.16 second advantage over second placed Will Farmer who was the leading Under 16 boy. In third spot lay Elodie Gage also under 16 but 2.44 seconds back.
Grace was the epitome of style, whilst her legs were a complete blur her upper body remained rock solid. To sustain such a high cadence over the longer distance was very impressive indeed!
Whilst Grace put in even more time into her rivals, Elodie closed the gap on Will but not by enough to secure second spot overall. Thus they retain their positions overall.
Tom White was the fastest under 14 boy & Henry Lewis the fastest under 10 year old.
The diminutive Kyle Crossan, the youngest rider in the field put in a courageous ride for an under 6 year old.
The race for the Seniors, Juniors (17-17 years), Veterans (40+ years old) and Ladies saw a number of new faces tak on the challenge.
These riders competed over 500M and 1,000M respectively. which doesn’t seem far – unless you are in complete agony after only half distance!
Times were very quick this year using rollers kindly lent to us by Paul Swinnerton of Swinnerton Cycles in Stoke – many thanks Paul.
Senior
The opening 500M round saw Jake White break the 20 second barrier with an impressive 19.87s.
In second place after the first round was Steve White 0.75s back – A former Champion and hoping to go one better than runner’s up spot held for the last two years. In third place at this point was Seb Bacon, last years Junior champion, 1.26 seconds off the lead.
However the 1,000M test can and did shake things up….
Due to his 3rd place seeding Seb faced veteran Alan Cooper in his ‘Head to Head’ over one kilometer….
Seb produced a wonderfully measured performance in great style to clock an impressive 45.35 seconds.
The two top seeds Jake and Steve were up against each other in the final ride of the evening….
Both riders started fast but it was Steve who held the advantage as Jake desperately tried to close the gap…
Despite setting two personal best times Steve’s total was still not enough to take the title just seven tenths of a second behind the new champion – Seb Bacon.
Jake held on or third spot a mere one tenth of a second further back!!!
All in all an excellent evenings racing – many thanks to all those who assisted with running the event and to the riders for taking part.