Herne Hill Velodrome

09-06-10 Track League 8

Herne Hill’s photos here.

• Overall League Table (Senior)
• Overall League Table (Youth)

The racing this week was he most open it has been in a long time, with only 3 of the op 10 of the overall league turning up to race. Rain all afternoon made it seem unlikely that the racing would go ahead, but many riders still turned up and were welcomed with a full programme of racing including the much anticipated individual pursuit.

The youth races on the night were also affected by the absence of some of the main contenders, with Aiden Woolven taking the win in the opening scratch race and the sprint. Chris McGovern placed well all evening picking up wins in the points race and he keirin. The 200m time trial was won by Charlott Cole-Hossain in an impressive 16.09, nearly as fast as some of the seniors the previous week.

On a night where many of his competitiors for a high placing in the league were away, James Solly was expected to dominate procedeedings. He looked very powerful in the scratch race, leading out from a lap to go, but faded slightly down the home straight allowing Stuart Hourigan to sprint round him to take the win ahead of Keith Coffey and Neil Irons.

Next up for the seniors was the devil. This proved to be a lively race spiced up by the addition of Herne Hil’s resident sprinters: Miles Stovold, Miles Annon and Simon Schmidt. It was Solly who lead the riders through at the bell with Stovold and Cook on his wheel. The riders didn’t start to wind up the sprint until they were just 100 metres from the finish, with Cook just getting the better of Stovold and Solly in the lunge for the line.

The Devil was followed by the highlight of the evening, the 6 lap indiviual pursuit. After his win in the scratch race Hourigan was clearly fired up and at one point looked as though he would catch all four of the other riders in the opening heat, setting the the time to beat at 3:38.28. Strong rides from Solly and pursuit specialist Simon Warren threatened Hourigan’s time, but just fell short. It wasn’t until the final heat that the opening time was beaten. After a restart to the heat, due to a rider puling his foot out, Keith Coffey stormed round the 6 laps to win by just a second.

With the addition of the sprinters the 3 lap dashes were very lively. The B category race was won by Eli Lassman after a well fought sprint with Will McFarland, second, and Graham Pierce, third. The A event was a very tentative affair with riders trying to calculate the best way to outwit the sprinters and come away with the win. On the last lap VCL rider Chris Goodman tried to take the initiative and surprise the others, but Stovold was quick to chase him down. As in the devil it was Stovold and Cook fighting it out in the approach to the line, but this time Stovold comfortably held on to take the win.

The final event of the night was a thirty lap scratch race. Goodman attacked from the start of the race and built a good lead for a few laps, before giving in to the chasing group. As he was caught the whistle blew for the first prime and the race really began to hot up. After a strongly contested sprint, won by Keith Coffey, a small group began to form off the front of the main bunch encouraged by Hourigan’s cries of “Keep it going - we’ve got the gap”! The breakaway included many of the strongest riders in the race such as Simon Warren, Hourigan, Coffey and Chris Cole. The lead group was strengthened further when Solly bridged the gap on his own to join the leaders. It looked as though the race was over for those who missed the break until Cook put in a hard turn on the front of the bunch to pull the break back. The race stayed together despite many more attacks and the riders began to prepare themselves for a bunch sprint. As the riders took the bell Warren sprinted off the front of the group with Coffey on his wheel and built a good gap. These two stayed away with Coffey taking a well deserved win after being the most aggressive rider throughout the race.