Location: East Hanningfield, Essex
Event: 22 April 2012
Report: Snowdon Sports
It was a day to celebrate for Essex Roads CC as one of their members, Colin Ward, won the race they had organised.
On the second lap, the 34-year-old Basildon rider decided to pull away from the bunch and cycled off into the horizon on his own.
As the race wore on, the pack managed to catch him up and he was in danger of being swallowed up into the field.
But he managed to make another break on the final lap and this time he stayed away, going on to record a memorable victory.
Colin said: “I sat in with the bunch at the beginning of the race, quite far back actually. I worked my way through to the front by the start of the second lap and as we approached a fast downhill section, someone decided to go for it.
“I thought I’ll just sit on his wheel and before I knew it, he’d gone and I was on my own with a gap of about a minute and a half behind me.
“I decided to just keep going and see how long I could keep out for and then by the fourth lap six riders had caught me up.
“Then on the final lap, I saw that some of the riders around me were looking tired so when we got to the part where it goes up a bit with about 3km left, I just went for it and managed to stay away.
“It was quite windy, although on the back section that actually helped to hold you up a bit and apart from that the weather held out, considering what we’ve been having recently. I was pleased with the win.”
Results:
3/4
1 Colin Ward (Essex Roads CC)
2 Ben Locke (Braintree Velo Cycling Racing Club)
3 Benjamin Brown (Cycling Club Hackney)
4 Ralph Mullan (Shaftesbury CC)
5 William MacFarland (East London Velo)
6 Ben Wright (VC Revolution)
7 Daniel Scott (Pro Cycle Hire UK Racing Team)
8 Thomas Dyson (East London Velo)
9 Joe Giggins (Pro Cycle Hire UK Racing Team)
10 Nick White (East London Velo)
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.
