First Round of the Ulster XC produces fantastic results
Dromara CC stepped up to the plate again by organising a fabulous event at Rostrevor. Martin Grimley and his team do some incredible work to change Kilbroney into a world class MTB event.
Many volunteers appeared down on Saturday for the setup and the wind over night clearly wasn’t playing ball as it tried to spoil the party. Early start on Sunday saw the course in its splendour with riders coming from all over.
The youngsters races were first up and Dromara had a few young stars in the making. In the Under 8’s Alex Harrower managed a super top 10 finish with brother Fraser doing the same in the under 12’s. In the under 10’s young Anthony Quinn showed his pedigree by producing a 10th place finish in a competitive field.
In the S2 Junior race Peter Davidson raced the course with ease and took an excellent 2nd place.
Peter showing how this MTB racing is done
With the youngsters showing how it is done it was time for the S4 racers to have a go on this technical course with a few hills to say the least. David Broome informed me that he wasn’t expecting much and just happy to have a go – I guess thats the attitude that gets you on the second step of the podium. Graham Smyth produced an excellent first time race on the MTB to take 7th and claims he will be back for more. I managed to sneak a 5th place which wouldn’t have happened if not for a quality bit of mechanical help from David Broome 5 mins before the start #preparationiseverything.
In the S3 race Paul Watson just missed out on a top ten finish with Adrian Booth fighting all the way to take 17th. Our very own John Shanks who is loving the S2 class fought all the way around the course to take 13th place in an elite field.
Loving the course
The Elite S1 race was missing Barry Kellett who was in full volunteer mode and managed to miss an epic race. Gareth Mckee produced a sensational ride to take the win and made the course look like a flat race track the speed he flew round. With David Montgomery snapping a chain it left Matt Adair and Lindsay Watson to battle out a very close fight with Lindsay taking that second place.
Gareth McKee on his way to the victory
Many thanks to the many club members for helping out as well as many members from neighbouring clubs which was very much appreciated. It needs a special mention that Martin, Lisa and Barry really gave a tremendous about of time to organise this fantastic event.
For the full results click here
