Rain before the start for the second year running made for some fast times in Wrekinsport CC’s 25, Round 7 of the SB Sports Injuries Series as Tomos Hales took a strong win despite deliberately conserving his strength for the next evening’s Shropshire Championship 25 and two personal bests were set. Starting at Crudgington, riders first headed south to Shawbirch before a long trek north to Espley island and a fast spin down the Hodnet bypass to turn and retrace to Waters Upton. Hales took the maximum 26 points available in this bonus point round due to being the longest distance in the 2023 SB Series, extending his lead at the top of the Series to a comfortable 32 points as he posted 55 minutes 36 seconds on an overcast evening. Understandably with the Championship 25 in his mind he wasn’t quite going ‘full gas’, but took the win by 2:36 from Wrekinsport team mate Phil Roberts, another rider with one eye on the big prize 24 hours later. Hales stated: ”The Wrekinsport 25 Mile went well, luckily the rain stopped before the start. With another 25 mile event the next day I tried to hold some back. I was happy to take the win; and thanks to the Wrekinsport team for organising the event”.
Roberts rose to sixth spot in the SB Standings thanks to taking runner-up spot with a personal best 58:12, having had the benefit of SB Junior Series leader Ben Southgate starting a minute in front. As seems traditional in Wrekinsport club events after Roberts overtook him Southgate did what he seems to do best and put a huge spurt on towards the finish to get a flagging Roberts back, just un-lapping himself to finish three seconds ahead on the road in 59:09. This was Roberts’ longest time trial of the year, and understandably it took its toll towards the end with the effort expended: He commented: “What looked like it was going to be a damp evening turned out to be fast conditions. I had a lovely carrot to chase down in Ben, and pushed hard all the way to a 25 personal best. I have only been doing 10 mile time trials this year, so to push on for a 25 PB was a nice personal milestone. Great to see so many Wrekinsport members brave both the weather and the long course. A huge thanks to the marshals as well, there were lots out there giving great support at each junction”.
Southgate opened up his Junior Series lead to a huge 88 points thanks to taking third overall, and was the final rider to beat the magic 25mph/60 minute mark – with James Ingram agonisingly missing out after finishing in exactly an hour. Southgate has had to put studying first recently so has had limited chances to train, so was pleased with his effort given the circumstances, commenting: “It went rather well considering the lack of training from my GCSE’s, thankfully they are over now so solid training ahead”.
In the SB Veterans Series the win was taken by Ashley Kirkham in +1:07 thanks to a huge personal best Actual time of 1 hour six minutes exactly. This is the first time Kirkham has beaten his Veteran’s Standard at the distance, and he took advantage of the fast conditions to lop over seven minutes off his previous best, a huge achievement. He stated: “Pre-race conditions had initially made me regret signing up, but once I got going enjoyed it. 10 miles in my numbers were telling me I was going a bit too hard, but I felt good so decided to hang in as long as I could. Another 15 miles later and I still felt good and finished with a 7 minute+ personal best”.
