VC Baracchi chairman praises riders

At the VC Baracchi annual meeting the club chairman Brian Boxall described the year’s results as excellent.

He paid tribute to the all-round success of Liam Gentry in road racing and open time trials.  He was a race winner in both and had beaten many of the club’s records.

He also complimented other members on their achievements, including Nicki Hawkes who had also broken club records and Chris Womack, to whom the veteran 10-mile record had fallen.

Other records were broken by Jenny Anderson and Joe Skipper.  Despite devoting his year to triathlon and winning a British triathlon age group championship, he broke the club’s 10-mile time trial record.

Partly as a result of their successful year, club members Liam Gentry, Nick Esser and Mark Westrup are taking up the opportunity to road race with the Norfolk-based sponsored team Strada Sport RT next year.  Boxall thanked them for their intention to ride next year’s time trials in the VCB colours and all members wished them well in their new team.

A decision was made not to change the club kit design next year, as had been considered, but to review the situation in a year’s time.

Good news was reported that although the club will not be promoting road races next year, other clubs have taken on similar events.   Iceni Velo and Strada Sport RT will fill the gaps.

Boxall commented to the effect that in event promotion VCB had excelled in the past and done more for local competition in that respect than many clubs, so members should not feel guilty that next year they would do less to provide events.

Nicki Hawkes kindly agreed to take over the job of event secretary in the May Day 10-mile time trial and members thanked Nick Esser for all his work in road race and time trial promotion in the past.

The officers are unchanged for next year.  The press officer reported that in addition to his contributions to Lowestoft Journal and the club’s website he had also posted photos on Flickr and the number of times these had been viewed demonstrated great interest in the sport.

This Saturday the club members will celebrate the year’s achievements at their presentation evening and this will be followed next day by the “Chairman’s Breakfast” ride to the usual Bungay café.

Last weekend the club’s riders rode in two club runs, one at 8.30am and the other at 9am.  The latter was conducted at a steady pace and covered nearly 35 miles.  These two rides will be resumed next weekend.

On Saturday John Thompson rode the Norfolk Nips 1 Audax from Hellesdon. It went first via Cawston to Weybourne, followed by a “testing stretch along the ‘up and down’ coast road to Mundlesey” for the cafe control, then continuing along the coast road to the next control at Happisburgh before returning.

He took just over five hours in the Audax and rode a shorter ride of his own the following day.  The Strada Sport riders are ramping up their training.  Esser and his colleagues recently rode 80 miles in just over four hours.