Slick time recorded from 40km time trial winner Brett Dal Pozzo

Albany Cycling Club’s premier 40km time trial was a great success, despite being held under threatening rain clouds and a challenging southerly wind on Saturday, March 19.

A big field of 17 riders set off at one-minute intervals to race against the clock.

Three new riders to club events participated and a large number of riders proudly wore the new ACC kit.

The foursome of Shirley Thurston, Steph Bennett, Lucy Wellstead and Jill Bascombe were off first and rolled turns efficiently throughout to finish in a time of just over 1hr. 20min., averaging 30km/h.

The individual riders in the women’s section were led home by ACC debutant Jessica Davison in an impressive 1:10, followed by Jenny Sammons, an accomplished rider, in 1:13, and Liz Cooper in 1:16. Sammons had the best age standard result of all riders on the day, in a magnificent effort.

All the male competitors raced as individuals, with some fast times set in spite of the wind’s best attempts to put a brake on the pace.

Paul Terry had a much-improved race on last year, finishing in 1:14, and Marius Coetzer rode strongly to record 1:09, including a quick equipment adjustment stop.

Newcomer Lachlan Carson rode a smidge faster, recording 1:08 at an average speed of 35.8km/h.

Third fastest was Jackson Pitman in 1:05, just a minute in arrears of Michael Gardiner, who stopped the clock at 1:04, averaging 37.7km/h.

Brett Dal Pozzo’s 1:01, on a standard road bike set-up, was the fastest time on the day, narrowly missing going under the coveted one-hour mark.

The club’s next event is this Saturday, April 2, and is the first road race of the season, the Denmark Handicap, on the very popular “teardrop” circuit.