Submission to Chronicle – late December 2018

Awardwinners

The Club had its annual Christmas meal at the Astbury Golf Club venue, to socialise, reflect and celebrate the achievements of the more athletic minded members of the cycling club. John Jervis as chair of the club welcomed members and guests from Leek and the town’s very own Madam Mayor Suzy Ackers- Smith who also has the equally esteemed role as Vice President of the Club.

The trophies were dominated by Ben Norbury, it is hard to know where to start with Ben in describing his successes, you soon run out of superlatives. Probably the most impressive result was his winning the Manchester and District 12-hour time trial back in August. Ben achieved the mind-boggling distance of 283.5miles at an average speed of 23.6 mph. This average speed includes times for natural breaks and stops for refreshments, so actual riding speed would be higher again.

Of the 29 trophies awarded, Ben won 8 of them including fastest mileage for 10, 25, 50, 100, 12-hour, Senior British all-rounder (BAR) and the Club’s evening time trial league. This list does not include all achievements of Ben in addition to the trophies, he won a further 8 awards.

Ben was not the only club member to take on the 12-hour time trial. We produced 5 of the 68 competitors. From this event, we not only won the aforementioned MDTTA Men’s championship but Polly Wilding also won the Ladies’ 12 hr championship at her first ever attempt. Moreover, club also became the 12-hour team champions. Mat Stephenson at a mileage of 245.42, Stephen Sladin at 230.72 miles and Lee Wood at 221.75 miles backed up Ben Norbury to win this award.

The need for brevity, does not permit me to list all awards given out, so will pick out a few notable areas.

Mark Allen won the Beartown trophy road race and he achieved a number of top 10 finishes, with a best placing of 3rd in a round of the March Tracks Summer Series on the Rhyl circuit. He has amassed 22 BC road race points with a third category licence.

Matt Stephenson, who made an excellent speech on behalf of the award winners won 4 trophies and 11 other awards including, evening time trial league, the veteran’s BAR and handicap, veteran’s club events and Stephen Sladin won 11 awards of which two were trophies.

To touring John Jervis won the men’s touring trophy and Jill Jervis won the women’s touring trophy with Steve Smith winning the Audax trophy.

Last mention should go to Roy Hayhurst who rightly won Club Person of the Year for his ongoing support to the riders taking part in the Club’s time trials. He turns out in rain, hail or shine and if you pardon the pun, especially went the extra mile in the support given at the 12-hour time trial. Matt when giving his speech on behalf the riders, gave tribute not just to Roy but to all the members who gave up their spare time to support the Club.

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