In a busy weekend of racing for members of the Ely & District Cycling Club – B&T Motor Repairs, junior rider Tom Lewis stole the limelight with his first road race win. Having won in cyclocross events, including taking the Eastern League Championship earlier in the year, this was his first ever win on the road.

Lewis was competing in the Ixworth Criterim race organised by West Suffolk Wheelers and held on a tight and technical 900m course around Ixworth which took place on the Bank Holiday Monday. Lewis managed to get into a three man break ahead of the main field of the U16 race but, light rain having made the road conditions slippery, this became a two man break when the third-placed rider crashed on a sharp corner at the bottom of the course’s only descent. With 10 minutes of the 30 minute race left to go, Lewis took the lead and put a gap between him and the rider in second place, a gap he held to the end to take the chequered flag in first.

Fellow junior rider Harvey Woodroffe was competing in the same event in the U14 category. Helping to ride down a solo break, Woodroffe was in the lead group at the end of the race, and sprinted to third place on the short uphill finish.

Woodroffe was also racing the day before, along with his father Joshua, in the Travers MTB mountain bike race series near Rochford. Both racing on their cyclocross bikes, Harvey was racing in the U16 category and during the first two laps, despite being held up at the start, he made progress through the field. However, an incident on the third lap meant that he was unable to use his lowest gear, making the long muddy climbs even harder to ride. However Harvey battled on, finishing in 10th place after 56 minutes of racing.

Joshua was racing in the League 2 category, with a race of 45 minutes plus one lap. The start of the race was eventful to say the least with a number of crashes, some of which required Woodroffe to dismount and carry his bike around fallen riders. At the end of the third lap Woodroffe thought the race was over, but was instead sent around for another lap. With his energy reserves spent, Joshua lost a few places on the last lap, but still finished in 29th place out of 45 riders after 1 hour and 27 minutes of racing, celebrating with a well-deserved burger at the end of the race.

The sole Ely rider competing in a time trial event was Colin Currie, who was racing in the Velo Club Baracchi event held on the B10/43 course near Bungay on Bank Holiday Monday. Currie finished the race in a time of 22:21 but at the time of writing the organiser has not published the official results so his placing in the race is as yet unknown.

Ely & District Cycling Club – B&T Motor Repairs Press Release 4th May 2023