By Emmerson Campbell
Two days after powering to victory in the feature 35-lap event of the Malta Supreme sponsored cycling programme in the National Park, Robin Persaud took his talents to the open road yesterday and sprinted away with the ninth annual NAMILCO Caricom Day winner’s trophy.
Persaud, arguably the most consistent local cyclist, won the event from a star-studded field that included national junior road race champion Raynauth Jeffrey, Warren `40’ McKay, junior star rider Raul Leal, last year’s national junior road race champion Paul DeNobrega and reigning senior road race champion Orville Hinds.
The 65-mile event, which Persaud won in two hours, 43 minutes and 17 seconds, pedaled off at NAMILCO’s compound at Eccles, proceeded to Long Creek on the Linden/Soesdyke Highway and returned to finish at the Two Brothers Gas Station at Eccles.
Besides the cash prize and trophy, Persaud also carted off a sprint prize as did Jeffrey, Jude Bentley and Junior Niles. Hinds and Mc Kay however, took home three sprint prizes each.
The event, which was a collaboration between Roraima Bikers Club and Banks DIH Limited, saw 69 riders facing the starter’s pistol despite the rainfall.
A majority of the riders were bunched up together for most of the distance with the lead interchanging periodically.
On the way back at Friendship however, the top six along with five other riders upped the ante and opened a lead of their own.
This lead peloton would journey together until Carlton Wheelers Cycle club mates Persaud and Jeffrey changed gears at Providence and opened a lead of their own.
Riding unchallenged after Providence, a one-two finish for the Carlton Wheelers Cycle Club was never in doubt as Persaud and Jeffrey maintained their lead and was still together with 150 metres to go.
With about 100 metres for the finish, Persaud, 36, and the 18 year-old Jeffrey rose from their respective saddles and a fierce sprint to the line ensued.
The in-form Persaud, however used his superior sprinting ability to find another gear and powered himself to the victory leaving his clubmate in his wake.
By taking home the overall second place trophy and cash prize, Jeffrey also dethroned DeNobrega as the event’s junior champion. Leal was second and DeNobrega, third in the juniors’ category.
The veterans, females and mountain bike riders turned back at the Soesdyke Public Road/Linden Highway Junction and returned to finish at the Two Brothers gas Station as above (approximately 36 miles.)
Talim Shaw successfully defended his veteran title by beating Steven Fernandes and Kennard Lovell who were second and third respectively.
While on the distaff side, Hazina Barett also successfully defended last year’s crown by pedaling ahead of Naomi Singh and Marica Dick respectively.
Michael De Roche took the top honours of the mountain bikers ahead of Keon Thomas and Hamzah Eastman.
All category winners were recipients of champion’s jerseys.
At the prize giving ceremony, Managing Director of NAMILCO, Bert Sukhai thanked the cyclists for making the event a successful one and stated that he has ambitions of raising the standard and the cash prizes of the event.
Said Sukhai “The company is very happy to once again to sponsor this cycle race, I understand that this year there were more entrants than last year and that is a good sign but we want to make it more popular and bigger next year.”
He continued:“It’s Caricom Day, it’s a holiday, it’s an ideal time to have a race that is remembered by everybody so I will be working along with the Director of Sport to see what assistance we will get from the Commission to make this race a bigger and better race. We want to increase the prize money, we know it’s like a token right now but I am sure we can do better.”
Brief congratulatory statements were also made by Director of Sport Neil Kumar, president of the Guyana Cycling Federation Cheryl Thompson and president of Roraima Bikers Club, Brian Allen.
Thompson and Allen emphatically reminded the cyclists that there is a need for more discipline in the sport.
