Team News – Bikeshed UEx team

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After a month’s hard racing in mixed conditions, the Bikeshed UEx team have started the season very well,

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Team News – Bikeshed UEx team

After a month’s hard racing in mixed conditions, the Bikeshed UEx team have started the season very well, showing at the front in every race tackled so-far, and against some formidable professional opposition.

UEx at Uni 2

With very main aims this year, including gaining exposure for Devon’s Bikeshed brand and distinctive colours, plus showcasing the University of Exeter’s prominence in sport and athlete development, the team are attempting a varied and broad race calendar during 2014.

For example, the team’s youngest rider, Ash Martin raced in the Trofeu Joan Serra in Mallorca against a 180 man field that included Pro and neo-pro riders. With a late attack from what was left of the peloton, he finished a highly creditable 14th, a great start.

The most eye-grabbing result during the first month’s racing was the almost clean sweep in the 2nd Cornish Series race at Portreath, with a 1, 2, 3, 5 finish. Al Murison taking a race-long solo victory from teammates, Pete, Oscar and Andy. A good sign of the team’s strength in depth.

March started very well with Pete Medhurst getting 2nd at Falco RR, after being in a race-long winning break with teammate Oscar Hutchings and 3 others. Then came the Betty Pharoah RR in Wales against the massed-ranks of NFTO and RaphaCondorJLT professional teams. Being vastly outnumbered, team tactics inevitably came into play, however Al Murison placed himself in the race winning break very handily, coming 15th against such strong opposition and numbers; it again bodes well.

The messiest race so far came at Modbury RR where each of the 3 favoured teams seemed to neutralise each other somehow, despite being the strongest in number! Ash Martin’s 9th however showed some of the strength he is now developing.

As part of the team’s varied programme, Time Trials will play an important role. Rich Oram competed in the Four Firs TT near Exeter and despite recording a PB on the course, missed-out on the win, placing 2nd. A good sign of his underlying strength however, that will be important later in the season. The Ham Hill RR again attracted a very good field, with riders from 4 of the 5 UK professional teams present.

On an untried and challenging course and on a very windy day, the guys showed great tactical understanding, and soon had 2 riders placed in a race-winning break that formed within 20 of the 110km. Working well in the break that inevitably included pro riders from Velosure and NFTO, the lead built to 2 mins, but with constant attacks in the last 30km, the group split, with Andy Feather coming 11th and Ash Martin 13th.

Again a good sign to be mixing it at the front of races against good quality opposition. As of April 8th, the team are ranked 15th in the UK team classification, an encouraging position to be. All the team’s news, updates and gossip can be found at the team’s Facebook page, Bikeshed-UEx whilst snippets and ‘live’ race news via twitter @BikeshedUEx.

 

Other Results on VeloUK (including reports containing results)

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