England and Australia today continued their domination of the Commonwealth Youth Games cycling events with Lucy Garner taking the women's road race title and Caleb Ewan winning gold in the men's road race.
Garner won the 37.5km event raced over five laps of a 7.5km circuit which took in sections of the Isle of Man TT motorcycle road racing course.
Heavy rain dampened spirits among the 19 starters and although England, Wales and Australia all tried to break up the field on the one climb on the circuit, it mostly regrouped on the descent. There were still 12 riders in contention as the race came into the finishing straight in front of the TT Grandstand in Douglas.
Garner outsprinted Emily Roper of Australia to take the gold with England's Hannah Barnes - who had won gold in yesterday's time-trial - taking third place.
Lucy Garner (left) wins the Women's Road Race at the Commonwealth Youth Games.
England won gold in the team prize with Garner and Barnes, and Harriet Owen who had finished in seventh in the road race. Australia (Emily Roper, Jess Allen, Jess Mundy and Allison Rice) won silver, and Wales (Elinor Barker and Amy Roberts) won bronze.
After the race Garner said: "The Australians made a lot of attacks, but our plan was to just mark them and to make sure we had an England rider in the break if anyone got away. I thought we did that really well and on the last two laps the race settled down and no one really went on the attack. I just made sure I got in a good position before the sprint. I was itching to sprint in the final straight but held back until 200 metres to go and timed it just right."
From left, bronze medallist Hannah Barnes, winner Lucy Garner, and silver medallist Emily Roper.
Caleb Ewan continued Australia's domination of the men's cycling events at these Games by taking road race gold 24 hours after his compatriot Alex Morgan had won the time-trial.
Ewan was part of a six-man break which finished 1min 52secs clear of the next group on the road. The Australians were aggressive from the gun but Morgan suffered mechanical problems on the opening lap and failed to get back in contention.
Ewan and his team mate Jack Beckinsale made the decisive selection and were joined by Owain Doull (Wales), Jon Dibben (England), Jayde Julius (South Africa) and Grant Ferguson (Scotland).
Men's Road Race Podium - From left, Jack Beckinsale (silver), Calen Ewan (gold), and Wales' Owain Doull (bronze).
Doull and Dibben both won stages of the Isle of Man International Youth Tour in May this year and looked favourites to add to their tally, but any advantage they may have had from racing and winning on Manx roads failed to break the resolve of the two Australians in the break.
With 40kms of the 100km race remaining the six leaders had an advantage of just over three minutes. Behind them there were some determined efforts to close the gap with Jonathan Cregeen (Isle of Man) and British National Road Race Champion Dan Pearson (Wales) among those trying to pull themselves back into contention.
The breakaway riders worked well together for most of the race but began to look at each other to make the pace in the last two laps. Their lead decreased but were still comfortably ahead as they lined up for the sprint finish.
The diminutive but powerfully built Ewan showed his rivals the kind of track speed which took him to gold in the Omnium at this year's World Junior Track Championships as he outsprinted Doull and Beckinsale who took silver and bronze respectively.
Australia (Ewan, Beckinsale, Morgan and Rob McCarthy) won the team prize, England (Dibben, Matthew Holmes and Sam Lowe) won silver, and Wales (Doull and Pearson) won bronze.
England's Jon Dibben leads the winning break in the men's road race at the Commonwealth Youth Games on the Isle of Man.
British Cycling would like to thank the organising team, officials and everyone else who helped promote this event. Our sport could not exist without the hundreds of people, many of them unpaid volunteers, who put in many hours of hard work running events, activities and clubs.
