Awards handed out at cycling club dinner
ANOTHER eventful year drew to the close for the members of Stratford Cycling Club at their annual awards dinner, held last Friday night, reports Ben Phyall.
The retrospective marks a changing of the guard as the outgoing chairman, Wedge Adams, bid his farewell to 20 years of stewardship and handed over to Steve Groves to build the club further.
Adams led the club through the rise in cycling participation, riding the wave of popularity following the 2012 Olympics and the uptake of more social riding following the pandemic. The club is now the most active in the regional cyclocross league and he will be using his new found time to explore his new passion for CX racing.
The next generation were in the spotlight too as the youth development officer, Alan Ford, gave an exciting summary of the impressive year that section had, with multiple domestic and international successes.
The guest speaker for the evening was the renowned track and time trial aerodynamicist Tom Ward who gave a fascinating insight into Team GB cycle track successes and broke the science of wind cheating down for the captivated audience.
New club champions were crowned and especially popular was the most improved rider, Dave Barker and the clubman of the year, Alan Ford, honoured for his enthusiasm for teaching the young and old dogs new tricks.
Stand out success was notable for Phil Marks, picking up four time trial awards for scratch (points), veteran and handicapped points as well as Best All Round TT, triumphing over 48 other riders from the 11-round season.
Not having it all his own way, there were other TT awards to Dawn Compton for best female and Nick Green for road bike TT, after a tie on points and a countback. Grabbing the juniors TT award, with just one point from another tight season long battle, was the indomitable Scarlett Ford. This has been one of the closest and exciting TT seasons and everyone is eagerly awaiting the start of next year's competition.
The most successful family were the best female cyclocross rider and most improved female, Ceri Shephard, and her husband, the newly crowned West Midlands V45 cyclocross champion Richard Shephard who was the best male cyclocross rider. The road race champion was awarded to Ben Phyall and Alex Mcrae was crowned hill climb champion.
The winter sees all but the hardiest of riders head inside and the best of these was awarded the Zwift racing trophy, Johann Breytenbach, followed by Brett Green, Dave Nath and Charlie Edmonds in their respective leagues.
Special thanks were given to outgoing club secretary Vicky Marks and welfare officer Darren Sherrif, as well as all the volunteers.
And there was a special exciting announcement that the club has created the Jim Riddler Bursary in the name of our founding member, who sadly passed away earlier this year, to support the most deserving of our junior riders with their future racing exploits.
