Cycle Club Basingstoke

Andrew Feather (HuntBikeWheels.com) and Alice Lethbridge (Drag2Zero) set new benchmarks on their way to victories in the Cycle Club Basingstoke HC.

Feather made it a second double weekend in a row as he charged up the Church Lane climb in a new course record time of three minutes and 21 seconds.

Meanwhile, Lethbridge took her maiden hill climb victory of the season beating the unbeaten record of Bexy Dew (Army Cycling) by the narrowest of margins.

The HHC018 climb has been shortened by 100 metres from the original 1.7-kilometre effort this season to move the finish line away from residential properties.

After an initial uphill kick away from the start the climb flattens out briefly before rising once again to a maximum of 14 per cent and easing in gradient towards the top.

On his first outing on the climb Feather made it four wins out of four finishing nearly 13 seconds clear of his nearest rival.

The race for second was counted back on tenths of a second with road man Frazier Carr (Spirit Tifosi RT) edging out George Spooner (Cambridge University CC) by seven tenths of a second.

It was even closer in the women’s category with the top three riders dipping well below the previous course record and all covered by little more than a second.

Lethbridge was eventually crowned the winner with 4-22.0, ahead of Dew with 4-22.4 meanwhile Bithja Jones (Pankhurst Cycles) finished a close third on 4-23.5.

There were fast times throughout the field with both the juvenile winner Finlay Hawker (VC de Londres) (3-54) and the junior winner Felix Tuck (VC Meudon) (3-57) dipping below the four-minute barrier.

* All reports are copyright of Cycling Time Trials/Snowdon Sports. Not to be used without permission.