Close racing in Road Club's three day race as honours are shared.

Monday, August 10, 2015
There was a tie for the overall honours in last week’s Ballymena Road Club – Chain Reaction Cycles – three day race, with Matthew Brennan and Ryan Bankhead both amassing a total of 27 points.

Each of the three rounds at Randalstown, Woodgreen and Glarryford had different winners with Ryan Bankhead winning at Randalstown, Jason Burns winning at Woodgreen and Matthew Brennan taking the honours at Glarryford.

Ryan Bankhead got off to the best possible start when he led in a three rider breakaway group at the end of the "short circuit” event at Randalstown on Monday evening. The entrants faced ten laps of the, two miles per lap, Ahoghill road, Branch Road, Portglenone road circuit. The short course didn’t allow for too big a handicap with an overall limit of four minutes from front to back. It was a tough course too with the hill on the Ahoghill road getting steeper each lap.

The scratch riders had easily made up their handicap by the fourth lap and then Connor Young and Matthew Brennan broke clear of the field on lap six. At the bell for the last lap these two led lone chaser Ryan Bankhead by 25 seconds and their positions should have been safe to the finish. However a "cat and mouse” final lap, which was 60 seconds slower than they had been achieving on the earlier laps, meant that Bankhead came across the gap and decisively won the three up sprint after 52 minutes 58 seconds racing.  

Connor Young was second with Matthew Brennan third. These three had 17 seconds to spare over fourth placed Jason Burns with Alan Blair fifth and Philip Morrison sixth – all at 17 seconds. (7) Jon Hilditch at 20 secs (8) Nigel Kernohan at 22 secs (9) Daryl Sempey at 32 secs (10) David Dougan at 2 minutes 12 secs (11) Gary McCappin at 3.00 (12) Laura Blair at 5.52 (13) John Maxwell at 6.42 (14) Martin Ruddy at 6.42 

Tuesday’s action centred on the 5 miles time trial at Woodgreen. Jason Burns was fastest with 10 minutes 31 seconds with Matthew Brennan second on 10.41 and Ryan Bankhead third with 10.44. 
(4) Eileen Burns 10.55 (5) Connor Young 10.58 (6) Daryl Sempey 11.31 (7) Philip Morrison 11.32 (8) Breandan McCavana 11.45 (9) Laura Blair 12.22 (10) David Dougan 12.31 (11) John Maxwell 12.33 (12) Alan Blair 12.52 (13) Gary McCappin 13.00

Handicap result (1) McCavana 12.03 (2) E Burns 12.15 (3) J Burns 12.16 (4) Young 12.17 (5) Brennan 12.22 equal (6) Bankhead and L Blair 12.25

Jason Burns leads the time trial handicap league series with three rounds remaining. He has 27 points, his wife Eileen has 24 points while Daryl Sempey is third on 22.
The final round of the three day race was the Sammy Gaston cup 25 miles road race, which was held over five laps of the Glarryford, Millar’s corner, Dunminning circuit on Wednesday evening.
Matthew Brennan was in dominant form and after his 5 minutes starting handicap was cleared  he went on to complete a solo attack and finish 2 minutes 26 seconds ahead of second placed Ryan Bankhead.

Matthew said "I attacked on the second lap just after catching the front group. After a lap a group of three were trying to get across to me. The three were   Connor, Jason and Breandan. I let them catch me before I attacked them again the third time up the climb. Then I just rode hard to open up a big gap without easing up at any point.”

Sammy Gaston Cup Glarryford 25 miles Road Race - Stage 3
(1) Matthew Brennan 62 minutes 18 seconds (2) Ryan Bankhead at 2 minutes 26 seconds (3) Jason Burns (4) Connor Young (5) Breandan McCavana at 2.58 (6) Daryl Sempey (7) Jim McConnell (East Antrim) (8) Alan Blair all at 2.58 (9) Gary McCappin at 3.08 (10) Ryan Currie at 3.21 (11) Laura Blair at 9.20 (12) John Maxwell at 11 minutes 05 seconds. 

Overall result of the three day race.
(1) And (2) Matthew Brennan and Ryan Bankhead 27 points each. (3) Jason Burns 25 (4) Connor Young 23 points (5) Daryl Sempey 17 (6) Alan Blair 14  (7) Laura Blair 11 (8) Gary McCappin (9) John Maxwell 8 points.  

The Ballymena Borough Council trophy will be shared between Matthew Brennan and Ryan Bankhead. Both Matthew and Ryan registered the same overall score and both had the same number of "wins” – one each, the same second places – one each and the same third places.
Road Racing league.

Ryan Bankhead continues to lead the club’s road racing league series which will be concluded at Glarryford when the Will Henry cup race takes place on 26th August. (The chief marshal for this race is Hall Booth) The eight race league is very close this year between Ryan Bankhead and Matthew Brennan.

Ryan has 56 points while second placed Matthew has 52. Connor Young is third on 38. A rider’s best seven scores from the eight rounds counts for the overall league positions.