Kristian House of Rapha-Condor won the British Road Championships 2009, we gave Chris Froome our “man of the match” award and there was plenty of sunshine.
That’s the British Champs in a nutshell, it really was a great day.
We thought we’d bring you a photo-rich piece from the race, since we took so many pics, and because over 11 hours in a car in one day has somewhat dulled our senses!
Hamish lives the dream, a wee house in the wilds of Belgium, slugging out it with the big hitters of he kermesse world, week in, week out.
He’s had some big wins out there, but ploughs-on, largely forgotten here in Blighty.
For the last few years we’ve helped Hamish out with race food and drink – the man who rides for Yawadoo and has earned the right to wear the red, white and blue stripes of a former British elite road race champion around his shorts and jersey.
Hi-5 and Cliff Bar were the precious cargo we carried and Hamish will be advising us how he’s getting on with them, as the season progresses.
Hamish gave us his take on the day;
“The Tumble climb was a kilometre too long for me – all my training is geared towards courses like the finish circuit is here – I just couldn’t stay with the leaders over the top, but I was riding strongly on the circuit.
“It’s difficult for the ProTour riders to get a result on a day like today; there’s so much weight of expectation on them.
“I knew Kristian was very well prepared, I saw that he had been getting good results in the Tour of Beauce in Canada – and that’s a hard race.”
As well as Hamish and the top four we grabbed a few words with some of the other names who mattered in Sunday’s epic.
Steve Cummings
Steve grabbed two big wins in Italy last year, this season it’s obvious that his morale isn’t the best – which is a shame; this is a man who Alberto Contador rated as a top team rider when they shared their tenure at Discovery Channel.
Barloworld has the reputation of not being the best organised of teams, Steve has just one race on the calendar for July and 11 for the whole of the rest of the season.
Alex was down with his dad for the day and did well to finish; he’s not had the racing required to build the form to go jousting with the ProTour boys;
“it was a hard race, The Tumble was tough, I tried to go with the front group but started to go backwards when I was three quarters of the way up!”
Ross Creber
Ross was one of those who suffered when Plowman Craven joined the long list of “imaginary pro teams” that have caused us to shake our heads, over the years. Now an Endura man, he took time to chat as he wiped away that Welsh dirt from his legs;
“I crashed before The Tumble, I got back but the birds had flown. I was 30th and top ten in the Under 23’s, so it wasn’t a bad ride; but I had a better one in me.”
Evan Oliphant
Big hero of the day for Scotland was another ex-PC man gone Endura, Evan Oliphant.
” James McCallum looked after me until the Tumble; there was a split just before it but we saw it coming and James ripped me right up to the front; I freewheeled into the lead group!
“Wiggins and Millar smashed it on The Tumble but I rode within myself and stayed close to Dan Lloyd and Roger Hammond; I knew they’d be a safe bet to get back on.
“We drove hard down off the Tumble; I only had a ’12’ and was revving-out.
“When House went, I hesitated, I thought Wiggins and Cav would bring him back. On the last lap, I attacked but Cav and Hammond countered and I couldn’t hold them when they came back at me.”
If we were rating Evan out of 10, Gazzetta style; we’d give him 8.5.
“Our early plan went a little astray; we had Tom Southam and Chris Newton down as leaders with Kristian and Simon Richardson as “floaters” – meaning that they would either adopt a supporting role for Tom and Chris or fall into a leadership role themselves.
“Half way up The Tumble it became “everything for Kristian” as we saw how things were going. He read the race perfectly; he’s been try so hard to get a win – too hard.
“He’s been so frustrated at the lack of results; in that respect it was a classic national championship – a good rider who’s off the radar comes along and wins it!”
VeloVeritas knows that self-praise is no praise, but we spotted Mr. House’s form way back in March, that’s why we interviewed him; and even back then, notice he spoke about winning today. Job done.
‘The best Commonwealth Games performance ever by the Scottish cycling team’ – that’s for sure. VeloVeritas hopes to speak to all of the athletes concerned and we’re proud to start with individual pursuit silver medallist, John Archibald.
Despite his flyweight 56 kilos Eddie Dunbar has already established himself as one of the worlds' best U23 riders with top ten finishes in the European and World U23 Time Trial Championships - and riding for the Irish team rather than his usual US Axeon Hagens Berman team he took Ronde victory in that bike riders’ Mecca, historic Oudenaarde.
Sometimes on the big tours you have to change plans; road closures, janitors, barrier crews, motorway crashes can all influence your 'best laid plans.' At the end of the day you may not have missed deadline - we rarely do - but there'll be that feeling that you could have done better. Then there are days when you have to struggle then struggle some more but eventually it comes together, you get to where you want to be and get those special pictures. This day was such a day; lost, lost again, a massive detour through the mountains - against race route to the top of the Colle Delle Finestre - but we really enjoyed our pizza after this one...
In 2016 in Belgium Ethan Hayter won the tough junior races, Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne, GP Serge Baguet, De Klijte-Heuvaelland, was in the winning team in junior European team pursuit champs and was British Madison champion with Joe Holt. Last year he won the u23 Berlin Six Day with Matt Walls, took a medal in every British track championship he rode and was part of the winning u23 Europeans team pursuit squad. This season he began training with the senior team in January and was world champion within weeks, at 19 years-of-age.
That man John Archibald is back in action again – and with a 48 minutes and 13 seconds ‘BANG !’ down on the Westferry course in the CTT ‘25’ Champs on Sunday past. It gave us a good excuse to catch up with the Commonwealth Games individual pursuit silver medallist and see what he’s been up to since The Gold Coast and what’s next on the agenda for him?
‘I’m a Believer,’ a great song, the Monkees had the hit back in 1968. I used to be a ‘Believer’ and can remember the sense of relief when we discovered that Lance’s Tour ‘positive’ back in 1999 was all a big mistake; those tricky corticosteroids had been in a cream he used to treat a saddle sore and he had a TUE to cover it. What a relief.
