Fraser-Green, Newton, Niles, Cornelius win national road race titles

—Fraser-Green makes successful defence of ladies’ titles

By Michael DaSilva
UNITED Kingdom- based Guyanese, Claire Fraser-Green successfully defended her ladies road race and individual time-trial titles while Raymond Newton, Junior Niles and Christopher Cornelius won their respective categories, when the Guyana Cycling Federation (GCF) held its 2016 National Championships yesterday.
The event, which is normally held along the East Coast Demerara carriageway or along the East Bank Demerara highway, was shifted to the Mahaicony circuit this year.
The ladies took to the circuit first for the 5.5-mile individual time trial and Fraser-Green who won the event for three consecutive years, made it four times yesterday, returning a time of 13 minutes.02 seconds.Christine Mattehson and Romella Samuels placed second and third respectively, both returning 15 minutes 30 seconds.
The order was the same in the ladies’ four-lap race, in which Fraser-Green clocked a winning time of one hour two minutes .06 seconds.
Newton on the other hand won the men’s over 45 years eight-lap race in convincing fashion, clocking one hour 55 minutes 42 seconds.
Finishing a distant second was Andrew Spencer and even further back was Shameer Baksh who occupied the third spot.
In the men’s under- 45 years of age eight-lap event, Junior Niles made a successful defence of his title with a time of one hour 54 minutes 22 seconds. Second was Stephen Fernandes while Paul Cho-Wee-Nam finished third.

Cornelius rode an intelligent race to win the juniors eight-lap race, recording one hour 48 minutes .04 seconds. Deeraj Garbarran was second and Brighton John third.
From the start of the junior boys event, Cornelius and Garbarran broke from the other starters and opened a commanding lead and together they took turns in pacing the race and after four laps had been completed, it was evident that only a mechanical problem could have prevented any of the two from occupying the top spot.
Midway in the race, Andrew Hicks wanted to jump the chasing pack, but decided against the move as Romelo Crawford just stuck on his (Hicks) back wheel, with the hope that Hicks would take him to the two leaders. In the end, John jumped the duo and went on to place third.

In the ladies’ road race, Fraser-Green stamped her authority from the start as she immediately took up the front and distanced herself from the other three starters.
Local cyclists will take to the circuit once again next Saturday to contest the individual time trials in each of their category and this will include the Elite Class which includes all of the country’s top riders.
Also, next Sunday, the men’s Elite Class will take to the outer circuit of the National Park for the Elite 70-mile road race which is slated to start at 11:00hrs.

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