The remainder of the 2021 season has seen further successes for members of the ARCC RT, none quite as impressive Ellen van Dijk in the women’s TT worlds or indeed the irrepressible entertainer that is ‘LouLou’ Alaphilippe who both produced outstanding performances to secure rainbow stripes in the usual end of season UCI festival of cycling. Oh, and we really should mention Zoe Backstedt here, the young Welsh wizard producing an outstanding ride to secure the women’s junior road race title for GB… Albeit we do have one comparative performance but more on that later!
The usual stalwarts of Ben Kitching and Darren Eggleton could again be seen at the various start lines over at Bovingdon, Hillingdon and Milton Keynes bowl, both accruing several points during the last couple of months and fortunately avoiding any notable visits to the tarmac. They were also accompanied by ‘JT’ Jordan Trace who has begun the process of joining the local crit racing scene and performing well in his first outings. A rumour has also circulated that Alan Wylie has secured his 3rd cat race status but as the chaps will tell you it was in Musette Café RT colours and therefore doesn’t count re club kudos. Although again he has said in order to help the café promotion, he’ll buy any member of ARCC a coffee when he is on site. Chapeau Al…nice touch!
Paul Blamire has continued his fine form this year in the longer TT formats setting a new club 50-mile benchmark during the VTTA national championship of 1hr 50:32, a cracking ride from Paul and we look forward to the inaugural men’s 100 record being set in 2022! This also brings us on to without doubt the performance of the season and yet again another outstanding ride and indeed achievement from ARCC’s own Dr. Caroline Whittaker. A certain club member in Tom Cudmore put it best when he described his difficulty in building up to staying awake for 24 hrs never mind riding a bike for that time. Caroline recording an outstanding 375 miles to finish 4th best female overall and first in her age group in the National 24hr TT championship held up in northwest in late July. In true Caroline style she simply cracked on, on her road bike with no personal event support relying solely on those friendly local northerners organising the event and in her own words ‘I experienced a couple of dark moments, however it really was a truly great event!’ An inspiration to us all Caroline and we’ll also celebrate you breaking the 400-mile mark next season! Chapeau to all those above representing ARCC, and we look forward to further successes as the Alan Wylie wattage bazooka hill climb season is upon us followed by the winter world of CX racing with Messrs Jones, Blamire and friends…
