Katie Archibald claimed victory in the third round of the Matrix Fitness Grand Prix Series with a blistering ride on the cobbled streets of Edinburgh.
With four laps of the 1.3 kilometre street circuit remaining Archibald (Pearl Izumi Sports Tours International) attacked to pull away from the leading group and put distance between her and the seven-time British cyclocross champion Helen Wyman (Matrix Fitness-Vulpine).
In the end, the Milngavie rider finished 29 seconds clear of Wyman with another Scot, Claire Thomas (Velosport-Pasta Montegrappa), crossing the line in third. Two more Scottish riders, Archibald's team-mate Charline Joiner and Fife's Eileen Roe (Starley Primal Pro Cycling) were fourth and fifth.
That finish was enough to ensure that Roe retains the red and white leader's jersey, while Archibald's efforts earned her the points jersey with a 100% success rate in the two sprint laps of the evening. Roe, Joiner and Archibald now occupy the top three places in the overall series rankings.
"That was tough," said Archibald. "It was clear it was going to split up from the very start and, when I saw the lap board go, I thought 'bugger it' and went for one more deep dig. Ultimately it hurts when you go slow and it hurts when you go fast. There is no easy way to go up that climb."
Roe said she was "surprised but delighted" to maintain her lead. "I'm obviously disappointed not to get a podium in a home race with everyone cheering me on but it was fantastic to be racing in the leader's jersey," she said. "I've got a taste for it now so I will need to work out a strategy to keep it."
It rounded off a busy day for the home riders with Archibald, Thomas, Joiner and Roe all named among the Team Scotland cycling contingent for Glasgow 2014. Archibald even managed to squeeze in a recce of the Commonwealth Games time trial course in Glasgow before heading through to race in the capital.
"It was nice doing a recce in our Scottish kit behind the Scotland team car doing the time trial route for the commie games," she said. "It's been a pretty patriotic day. I've enjoyed it."
Jon Mould, of NFTO Pro Cycling, won the sixth round of the men's Pearl Izumi Tour Series by a 12-second margin, leaving Tom Scully (Madison Genesis) and Kristian House (Rapha Condor JLT) to battle it out for second and third respectively.
Evan Oliphant (Team Raleigh), who described the course beforehand as "brutal", was the leading Scottish finisher, eventually crossing the line in eighth place.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article