TACTICAL riding from Team Coco and Caribbean Junior cycling champion, Paul De Nobrega, saw him cart off the top prizes for the Open and Junior categories of the Roraima Bikers Club (RBC)/Digicel/Avon Breast Cancer Awareness 25-lap cycle road race held around the outer circuit of the National Park last Sunday.

Continental Cycle Club’s Geron Williams, Paul Choo-Wee-Nam, Enzo Matthews, Michael Anthony and Warren McKay completed the top six for the event, which saw 70 riders, including four females, sent on their way by Digicel’s Head of Marketing Jacqueline James.
James did so, after a one-lap race in which several executives from Corporate Guyana, including Ansa McAl’s Nigel Worrell, James and Digicel’s Customer Services Manager Sherwin Osborne, rubbed shoulders with Guyana’s elite and junior cyclists.
De Nobrega’s win in the Open category, earned him the top junior title for the event, with his Team Coco teammates in Anthony and Raul Leal, rounding off the top three while in the Veterans category, Ian ‘Dumb Boy’ Jackson copped the top podium spot away from Junior Niles and Ralph Williams respectively.
Naomi Singh was the first female to cross the line, doing so ahead of Linden’s Hazina Bharat, while 12-year-old Tyriqe Hall and 70-year-old Maurice Fagundes took home accolades for the Youngest and Oldest finishers of the event.
De Nobrega took home $100 000, the Digicel Breast Cancer Awareness riding jersey and a trophy for his Open win, $30 000 and a trophy for his top junior spot, coupled with four of the 25 sprint prizes and one of four cell phones that were up for grabs.
Geron Williams $80 000, trophy and two sprint prizes, Choo-Wee-Nam $60 000 and trophy, Matthews $40 000, trophy, nine sprint prizes and a cell phone, Anthony $20 000, trophy and three sprint prizes and McKay $10 000, trophy, one cell phone and a sprint prize.
Anthony and Leal also got $20 000 and $10 000 each for their runner-up positions behind De Nobrega in the junior category, Jackson, Niles and Williams $30 000, $20 000 and $10 000 each for their placings in the Veterans category while Singh and Bharat got $20 000 each and Hall and Fagundes $15 000 each.
Of the remaining sprint prizes, Robin Persaud claimed one, along with a cell phone, Raynauth Jeffrey three and Shaquille Agard and Walter Grant-Stuart one each.
As early as the ninth lap, the men were separated from the boys, as the competitors were forced to battle with the Atlantic breeze that was blowing in a north-easterly direction, especially when they were making their way north up JB Singh Highway, to turn west into Carifesta Avenue.
By the 16th lap, a group of eight cyclists comprising the top six along with Grant-Stuart separated from the field, opening a gap of two minutes over another small pack that included Leal, Jeffrey, Sankar, Persaud, Marlon ‘Fishy’ Williams and Alonzo Greaves.
Williams and Greaves faded into oblivion from this pack, while Grant-Stuart suffered a spill as he turned east into Thomas Lands, coming out of Camp Street, reducing the frontrunners by one, which they were contented with, working in tandem until the final lap.
McKay found it difficult to keep up with the other top five due to an injured wrist with three laps to go and rode in as a lone cyclist for the number six position, after De Nobrega had outsprinted Williams to take the top prize.
Prior to the start of the main race, dozens of persons and organisations participated in a one-lap fun race to highlight the same issue of Breast Cancer. There was an in-house competition among the Digicel staff, with Osborne taking the male category and James the female.
The outer circuit of the National Park takes in Carifesta Avenue, Camp Street, Lamaha Street and JB Singh Highway. Apart from Grant-Stuart’s spill, there was one other incident, where Andre Abdool reported to the organisers that RBC’s Mario King had punched him in the face, an act King admitted.
Digicel’s Head of Marketing Jacqueline James, in brief remarks before the presentation, congratulated all the participants for making the race in its inaugural year a resounding success.
“I must thank you all for making this event in recognition of Breast Cancer Awareness remarkable. It was heart-warming to see so many of you come out in support. We hope to make it bigger and better next year.”