Armidale Cycling Club

With Armidale riders in all 5 grades of the Tamworth Two Day Tour last weekend (9-10 August), the possibility of a clean sweep was on the cards. Well, “possibility” is perhaps a bit strong - in truth, we may have had some chance if everyone else stayed home.

The reality is that this a pretty tough event with 3 races held over the 2 days, and with over 160 riders entered in total, the competition is stiff.

Geoff Straub was our go-to man in Division 1, while Mitch Bullen found himself in Divison 2, Bill Mara and Nick Myhill were in 3, Andrew Swan in 4, and Bruce Buxton 5.

The second race on day 1 always seems to be the hardest, and this year proved to be no exception. In fact it was so hard that three of our number decided not to come back for the final race on Sunday (not mentioning any names). The other three (Straub, Mitch, and Andrew Swan) did however complete the Tour.

Most successful was Straub who finished a very creditable 7th in Division 1, only 4m23s down on the overall winner Chris Jory of Port Macquarie.

Mitch Bullen was given a tough handicap in Division 2, but rose to the challenge extremely well to finish in 10th place, around 5 minutes behind Anthony Chapman of the Hunter club. Kyle Hughes made it a highly successful day for Hunter by taking out Division 3.

Tamworth had a strong contingent in Division 4, with Mark Jarvis riding consistently in all three races to finish in first place for the overall. As usual, Andrew Swan made sure the majority of riders finished before he crossed the line, ending up fairly well down in the classification.

Grant McMillan (Kooragang) won Division 5 with Tamworth riders Paul Davis and Ty Tucker in second and third. Bruce rode very well in the final stage, being awarded a time of 2h14m10s, which was very impressive given that he was at home in bed at the time (woops, didn’t mean to spill the beans there - sorry Bruce).

The question most asked was “where’s Wilko?” - we certainly spent a lot of time explaining his absence.