Banbridge Cycling Club’s race organising committee were kept on their toes with a full programme of races on Sunday when they hosted the Noel Teggart Memorial races.  With 3 separate senior races plus a full programme of youth racing there was something for everyone.

 

The whistle was blown at 12 o’clock when the first of the races, the ‘A’ race - accommodating A1 & A2 riders, started at Havelock Park on the Lurgan Rd.  The ‘A’ race covered 7 laps of the 17km Banbridge/Gilford/Scarva/Banbridge circuit.  With a high quality field, containing many riders who were recently competing in the UCI ranked FBD Insurance Ras, the action and speed were high from the start with various attacks on the first lap. The most effective of which contained Newry Wheelers’ Mark McKinley along with Lurgan man Thomas Martin of Eurocycles and his team mate Conor Murphy.  With 3 laps remaining McKinley made a valiant solo effort and held a 20 second lead over the remainder of the 10 man breakaway group until the last lap, when  both the Eurocycles riders bridged the gap to make a front group of 3.  Using the team advantage both Martin and Murphy repeatedly attacked the Newry rider with Martin giving the final attack that broke the elastic and crossing the line alone much to the delight of a bunch of local Lurgan supporters.  McKinley led the sprint out for 2nd but was narrowly beaten by Murphy.  Johnny Cole of Team Madigan led the remainder of the break home.

 

The ‘B’ race, held for ‘A3’ riders, was also action packed with attacks coming thick and fast.  The most significant coming from veteran riders David Gardiner of BikePure and John Madden of Curran Racing who opened a lead of 40 secs over the chasing bunch.  Despite the strong firepower in the 2 man break the race all came together on the final lap and it looked like a large bunch sprint was inevitable until first year junior Nathan McAleer of Curran Racing and Kyle Houston of Phoenix CC made one final attempt at glory attacking in the closing miles.  The pair were successful, holding off the fast chasing bunch with the Phoenix rider making it 2 wins in 2 days for the Belfast club.  Banbridge CC’s Liam McKiverigan led home the bunch to take third place, showing he has good form as the racing season approaches his favourite race of the year; The Newry 3 day.

 

The ‘C’ race for the ‘A4’ riders consisted of the usual numerous attacks being chased down time and time again without any real significant time gaps being opened until the last lap when Banbridge mountain bike ace Matthew Adair put in a massive effort coming through Gilford.  Coming into Scarva his lead was up to 20 seconds, the biggest time gap of the day.  With the finish within reach the normally torturous drag out of Scarva appeared almost flat as the young Banbridge star danced up the road, in his usual eccentric but obviously effective riding style, increasing his lead to almost 2 minutes on the way to a popular home victory for the promoting club.

 

Dromore uprising star Mark Downey of Banbridge CC gave the home crowd another reason to celebrate, taking yet another under 14 race win in convincing style from Adam Kerr of Ballymena RC and Aaron Swan of RSC Racing.  Cormac Clarke of Newry Wheelers took the win in the under 16 event while Jake Gray of Juiced/Orchard Wheelers won the under 12 race.