Tag: Scottish Hill Climb Championships 2009

The good news is that Scotland is eligible to field a team in the UCI Track Nations Cup events and encouragingly, we have around a dozen riders vying for a ride. One of those on the squad is 19 year-old Matti Dobbins from Bridge of Weir, who as a junior was a Scottish track champion across multi-disciplines and has been trialling with the GB squad at Manchester, focusing on making the GB and Scottish Team Pursuit squads.

Stage one is Middelkerke (home to the Tom Boonen fan club) to Zottegem, wearing-on for 200 K, when you include two laps of a circuit in the 'bergs' near Oudenaarde. All of the hills which give Het Volk, Kuurne, De Panne and Flanders their particular character are contained within a relatively small area.

VeloVeritas has spoken to Katie Archibald and Jack Carlin - but our review of Scottish medallists at The Track Worlds in Apeldoorn wouldn’t be complete without speaking to Mr. Mark Stewart, bronze medal winner in the points race behind that remarkable Aussie, Cameron Meyer who took his fifth points title with big Dutchman, Van Schip taking silver.

As James McCallum (Rapha Condor Sharp) prepared for the recent Tour of Normandy (won by Europcar’s Jerome Cousin) he took time to talk to VeloVeritas about his hopes for the 2012 season - his sixth as a professional.

Did I say that having the camper van here meant that I didn’t have to walk to the press room? We look at the Time Trial Bikes of the World Championships.

Question Marks. Today is a long, lumpy stage with a kicker in the final 2km. It's not hard enough for the GC boys to do more than snipe a few seconds on each other here or there, but maybe too hard for the pure sprinters to be a part of the finale.