Under the watchful eye of Mark Bullen and plenty of parents, no less than 10 riders were put through their paces as part of the freshly launched Armidale Cycling Club Development Program today. The program replaces what was previously called Juniors, and is designed to appeal to young and old alike, in fact anyone who would like to develop road riding skills, and will ensure riders are better equipped to ride on the road if they choose to progress on through the club grading system. Get in touch with the club if you’re interested.
The format will vary from week to week but typically will involve a warm-up, then a one lap time trial which provides riders with a performance benchmark and something to aim for as they develop strength and skills. This may then be followed by a Handicap Race and Italian Pursuit depending on numbers.
This week Rosie Harris, Zach Hale and Imogen Hale raced in a 1-lap handicap race after the ITT. Imogen went off Go with Rosie at 15s and Zach at 30s. The girls came together on the climb at the back of the course and raced side by side for the line down the home straight with Rosie just edging it on the line and Zach not far behind.
The older riders raced a 5-lap handicap which was also a close race with Jacqueline Tracey finishing well to win from Theron King and Lucy Cook. This was followed by an Italian Pursuit with the team of Jacqueline, Brendon Cole, Jason Tracey and David Cook coming home as winners.
The ITT times are shown below and we’ll work on putting these into a more prominent table on this website soon so riders can keep track of their Personal Best times and how far off the magic 2 minute lap they are (development riders who beat a time of 2 mins for the 1.2km course win a club jersey). There were some strong rides today with Tom Simmons and David Cook both recording times under 1m:50s.
Well done to all our riders today and thanks to Mark and of course Deb and Karlee and everyone else who continues to support development cycling at our club. Don’t forget the Junior Championships are just 3 weeks away now on Saturday 7th November after the seniors criterium which starts at the earlier time of 1:30pm that week.
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