The 2006 Provincial Track Cycling Championships were held at the Forest City Velodrome in London, Ontario. This is one of only 3 indoor tracks in North America, built just 1 year ago. It is the smallest velodrome in North America. It’s 138 metres in length and has sharp 50 degree bankings. With over 70 riders registered for the championships, the field was the largest that Ontario has seen in many years, showing that the sport of Track Cycling in Ontario has grown back to exciting new levels of days gone by. 1982 World Champion and Multiple World Record holder, Gord Singleton was racing on the weekend. He showed everyone that he is still in great form, competing with the Senior Men. He won the Silver Medal in the Senior Men’s Sprint and the Bronze in the Senior Men’s Kilometre Time Trial.
My first race was on Friday night. It was the 500 metre Time Trial. It took almost 4 laps of the 138 metre track to cover the distance. I clocked in at a time of 41.36 seconds, winning a silver medal, just 0.18 seconds off of first place.
Racing started up again Saturday afternoon with the Individual Pursuit. I had a decent ride in a time of 4:10.66 and won the Gold medal. Next up for me was the Scratch race which took place Saturday night. Maogosha Pyjor and I attacked the field 3 laps into the 60 lap race. We worked together to lap the other riders twice. It came down to a sprint for first and I fell short by half a bike length. Maogosha won and I came second.
Sunday’s racing consisted of the Points Race and the Team Pursuit, which was a demonstration event for the Championships. The Points race saw my second Gold medal of the weekend, bringing the overall tally for the weekend to 2 Golds and 2 Silver Medals.
I will be focussing my training for the next month on preparing for the Lehigh Valley Velodrome’s opening season track races on June 3 and June 9. These are UCI sanctioned races and should draw some International level track riders looking for UCI points, so there will be some very competitive racing. This track is located in Trexlertown, Pennsylvania:
http://www.lvvelo.org
Julia’s Ontario Provincial Track Racing Results:
Gold Medal: Individual Pursuit, Points RaceSilver Medal: 500 metre Time Trial, Scratch Race
Full Women’s results can be found here:
http://www.forestcityvelodrome.ca/results/Results_April_21-23_06_Women.pdf
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