Ryan Bankhead wins Tommy Smyth cup for road race series

Monday, May 19, 2014
Ryan Bankhead’s finishing sprint once again proved too powerful for his rivals in last Wednesday evening’s Ballymena Road Club – Chain Reaction Cycles – scratch road race at Slaght.
There was a smaller than usual entry for this event, which was the third and final round of the Northstone sponsored "scratch road racing league” as many BRC riders were taking part in the opening round of the inter-club road racing league at Magherafelt.
Nevertheless the 26 who took part enjoyed perfect racing conditions and this helped to keep the group together throughout the 18 miles event.  The race started at Slaght corner and then completed two laps of the Whitesides road, Ahoghill road, Caddy road circuit.
Bankhead won comfortably, by about three lengths, just as he had done in round one at Broughshane, and these two wins, combined with his fourth place at Ahoghill earned him the overall league honours and with it the Tommy Smyth cup. Ryan Shaw’s consistent scoring with eighth place at Broughshane, second at Ahoghill and third at Slaght took him to second in the league.

Result 
(1) Ryan Bankhead 42 minutes 15 seconds 
(2) Karl Taylor 
(3) Ryan Shaw 
(4) Stephen Dempsey 
(5) Martin Robb (Bann Valley) 
(6) Mark Wright 
(7) Matthew Brennan 
(8) Quinton McFall 
(9) Alan Blair 
(10) Nigel Kernohan 
(11) John Shaw 
(12) Gerard McNally (Bann Valley) 
(13) Clifford Grant 
(14) Martin Ruddy 
(15) Colin Scullion 
(16) Hall Booth 
(17) Tommy Wilson 
(18) Conor Crilly 
(19) Simon Taggart 
(20) Aaron Swan (N Roche performance team) all same time 42.15 
(21) Sean Wright at 18 seconds 
(22) Breandan McCavana at 5.13

League 
(1) Bankhead 27 points 
(2) Ryan Shaw 20 points 
(3) Connor Young 19 
(4) Matthew Brennan 13 
(5) Alan Blair 12 
(6) Stephen Dempsey 10 points.