Cycling: East Lancs two stage hill climb

Dan Evans winning stage one in the East Lancs hill climb

East Lancs organised a two stage hill climb on Sunday, which comprised a morning climb of Huddersfield Road from Newhey towards Denshaw and an afternoon climb of Buckstones Road in Shaw.

Both climbs are similar at approximately one mile in length with similar gradients.

The weather was blustery but for most riders the rain held off, at least keeping them dry if not warm.

The field for the event was excellent with Adam Kenway the current National Hill Climb Champion participating and also Dan Evans taking part who was the 2014 champion, both being challenged by a number of high quality contenders.

Dan Evans won both stages, Adam Kenway was second and Mike Morris third. It looks likely all three riders will feature prominently in the national final in Northumberland in October.

For the East Lancs, Pat Cooke took the fastest junior prize from his brother Joe, and Karen Bailey won the ladies fastest veterans prize.

East Lancs Girls Youth Team riders Niamh Coulter, Nicole Decamps and Sofia Riley travelled to Peterborough on Saturday to ride in the National Youth Championship Final.

This 10 mile time trial was held on the N1/10 course which uses the old A1 road. The course is undulating and it contains three roundabouts to navigate out and back which means it is not terribly fast. However, in torrential rain which thoroughly drenched the road surface making it slippy in places, all three girls had good rides with times of 33:27mins; 32:31mins and 33:15mins respectively.