Continuing a rich vein of form, Colin Parry (Wilier/Live 2 Ride) made it three wins in April with victory in Cardiff Ajax CC’s 70-mile Legstretchers Memorial To Betty Pharoah road race in South Wales.
The 33-year-old jumped across to a leading group of four riders – including team-mate Hugh Wilson - on his own in the closing stages of the four-lap race before powering clear on the climb to the finish to win from Harry Grey (Vanillabikes.com) and Russell Falder (Cycle Premier).
“It’s all gone really well – April has been a very good month,” said Parry, from Lydney, Gloucestershire, who in between wins in the Ham Hill and Glade CC Spring road races, also finished third overall in the four-day Ras Mumhan in Ireland where he wore the green jersey of points leader.
“We had a good training camp in Benidorm at the end of March which set us up just right.”
Conditions were tough for the four-lap race, over an undulating course near Bridgend, with strong crosswinds and showers, and Parry found himself heavily marked in the early stages before a leading group, including Wilson, went clear.
Going into the last lap the main body of the field was still two minutes down on the leaders, but as the bunch split, a chasing group of around a dozen riders formed and with Parry pushing hard, they cut the gap to 30 seconds with three miles to go as the leading group also broke in two.
“I rode as hard as I could on a downhill headwind stretch and managed to get a gap and go across to the leaders on my own,” said Parry, who works full-time as an actuary for an insurance company. “Hugh started to attack but was brought back, then he went again, and it gave me a couple of minutes to recover and when we turned on to the climb I put the power down and went as hard as I could.”
Some of the edge was taken off for the winning team by a crash for their junior Dan Pearson, who was taken to hospital for a check-up after going over the handlebars and colliding with a stationery car.
Results:
1 Colin Parry (Wilier/Live 2 Ride) 3-4-00
2 Harry Grey (Vanilabikes.com)
3 Russell Falder (Cycle Premier)
4 Rhys Lloyd (Metaltek-Scott)
5 Hugh Wilson (Wilier/Live 2 Ride)
6 Glyndwr Griffiths (Urban-Cycles.co.uk RT)
7 Robert Smail (Teamwallis CHH)
8 Dale Appleby (Metaltek-Scott)
9 Will Bjergfelt (Wilier/Live to Ride)
10 Ed Laverack (Team Tredz)
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.
