Dromara Ladies shine at Ulster Cyclo-Cross Championships

Island Wheelers would host the very best Cyclo-cross riders from all over Ulster and test their skills in Windmill Park, Dungannon. This course is well known for being a tricky course in the dry never mind the wet, and with the deluge of rain over the week it was never going to be dry.

The early pre-entries would show that Dromara CC do enjoy their cyclo-cross as they had teams in all the championship disciplines. It was great to see several members make their comeback after a few weeks out as well.

The Juniors would race in the morning and it wasn’t until the U12 race for a bit of Dromara CC colour would hit the mud. James Armstrong has had a fantastic season and his winning run would surely be tested on this course. James had a great start into the first corner but was hounded all the way by Conor Murphy who would keep James on his toes. With no mistakes and a strong finishing last lap James would take the win. Ben Wilson was back at the cyclo-cross again and taking on the Junior men category and as always he made the technical bits look easy although I get the feeling he is happier on the MTB. He gritted his teeth and and battled to a fantastic 5th place.

The next race up would see the Dromara Ladies tackle this treacherous course which would surely test all of their skills. Diane Wilson is known for her slow starts normally due to a poor gridding position but once she gets a bit of clear track the lap times tumble. Sticking to this script Diane would start to move up the field after the first lap showing her skills on the tricky sections as well as utilizing her running background for the hilly run up. With the laps running out she would cross the line to be crowned the Master Ladies Ulster Champion. Behind her Martina Hawkins was having a great race and would carve through the course with ease making the hilly climb look easy compared to the rest. Martins would just run out of laps to catch Gill Smith and will have to settle with an excellent Bronze medal in the Master Ladies. The senior ladies would see Rachael Irvine dominate the race to claim the gold medal but behind her our very own Andra Hamilton who has bee getting better every race she has entered put in a ride of her life to  hold off Ellie McCardel from Square Wheels to claim a silver medal in the Senior Ladies. The Dromara Ladies also claimed the team prize to cap it off.

In the Mens M40.M50 & M60 race the pressure was on to see what the men could do. Neil Armstrong has had a great season and he put in another sterling performance to claim 11th place with Richard Cowan taking 24^th followed by Paul Hamilton and Brian Kellett taking 26^th and 37^th respectively. Derek Graham would take 11th in the M50 and only just miss out on a top 10 finish. Mike Barton would again produce a brave performance to become the M60 Ulster Champion and looks forward to the Irish National Championships in January.

This would leave the senior Men to finish of the day and what a race to finish with. Our very own Barry Kellett would take the hole shot to notify the rest that he was back in the groove. The race would see a three way battle between Graham Boyd, David Montgomery and Thomas Creighton with the race lead changing each lap. Behind them Barry Kellett was in a battle to claim a top 10 position with the other team members Graham Smyth and Darren McCann desperate to finish as high as possible considering the team prize was up for grabs. On the final lap Graham Boyd would make the decisive move and become Ulster Champion followed by David Montgomery and Thomas Creighton. Barry Kellett would take 8^th place with Graham Smyth 14^th and Darren McCann 16^th meaning Dromara CC would claim 2^nd Team only missing out by the slimmest of margins.

Behind the scenes the pit crews worked tirelessly washing bikes and doing the bike handovers with panache showing a real team performance. Many thanks to Philip Blair and the Belgium Project for the use of the photos. Finally a huge thanks to all the team at Island Wheelers who put on a fantastic event. Next race will be the Irish nationals in Cork.