What a difference a year makes. Last year’s Irish Championships were held in Wicklow and only one determined North Down rider turned up to contest the coveted Irish Champion’s jersey. This year the club was represented in just about every senior category. Elite, Masters and Veterans were all there battling against Ireland’s best. After a fortnight of glorious weather the course was in great condition. What a course it was too! After last year’s course, which was an uninspiring, damp, off camber heavily rooted track the guys at Carn Wheelers had done a magnificent job at Garvagh Forest putting together an altogether superior course for racing on. Only an hour from Belfast the forest had a bit of everything to keep any enthusiastic mountain biker on their toes.

William Barclay National Championships

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The big cycling news at the weekend was the Track event based at Sundrive Road in Dublin. This was the first time that Dublin had held a UCI ranked track event for 50 years so there was big excitement with riders from all over the world participating in the hope of gaining some precious UCI points.

Rachel Mitchell was there representing the club mixing a very successful season on the road with some aggressive track racing too. Readers may note that Rachel has already picked up her share of trophies this year racing alongside Janine McNally and the rest of our successful racing ladies team. Winning the PJ Logan Cup, at The Bush, and a second place at Bartlin’s Bay may seem like a fine season to some but Rachel’s talent lies not only in her speed but her range and depth of abilities.

Rachel Mitchell

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This weekend saw the country’s top A2 and A3 cyclists head to Newry and Mourne for the Newry 3 day promoted by Newry Wheelers. The race, in its 26th year, had a full field and with some great racing guaranteed over 4 stages over 3 days around some of Ireland’s most beautiful countryside. As ever North Down was in the thick of the action fielding a strong team of four. Shane Farren, Paul Ferguson, Michael McMullan and the venerable Noel Boyce were there to test their form.

Friday night kicked off with a 40 mile road stage starting and finishing at St. Marks High school, the riders tackling 35 flat miles until they hit the Grinan Road climb. The lads were riding hard moving up to the front of the peloton to ensure a good position for the final dash down into the finish at Warrenpoint. Paul unfortunately unshipped his chain at this point losing a couple of minutes and any chance of a GC position. The rest of the lads finished strongly however finishing well up the bunch. Local rider, Ian Ingles, took the stage setting him up nicely for Saturday morning’s Time Trial.

Points Make Prizes

Ian continued to consolidate his hold on the race during the 2.5 mile time trial running from Hilltown to Rathfriland with the North Down team riding strongly to maintain their hard fought GC positions.

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Saturday was a wild and wet day for the riders in the Bobby Crilly Classic race promoted by Phoenix CC. The event, now famous for its Divis mountain top finish, had three races, the combined A1 and A2 race, the A3 race and the A4 race.

The A1 and A2 riders faced three laps of the 15-mile circuit that has several drags and a short steep climb near Muckamore. Then the race would turn up the road to Dundrod before beginning the seven mile climb to the top of Divis.The A4 race was also a scratch race with two circuits before the climb. As in the A3 race quite a few riders attacked the bunch but none of them were given much freedom and as the climb started they were all together.

Shane Farren

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