The British National Championships are held in Sheffield and an all-flat parcours this year.
Defending road champion Dowsett is here to support Bibby (Jaguar), while have clear favorites like Swift (Vesuvio), L Rowe (Good Energy) and Kennaugh (Vueling).
Also M Rowe (ASDA) may fancy his chances, given that his team is one of the strongest in numbers. The whole race heavily depends on teams like ASDA, Good Energy and Eddie Stobart, while also Jaguar lines up with a 5-men-squad.
Oh well, that's what you call a worst-case-scenario then:
build the break of the day! The four strongest teams all featured in the break.. you know, what that means..
Yap, the peloton won't show too much interest/efforts to pull the escaping group back!
So let's jump straight into the final 3km, where we see the first attacks:
Rowsell tries to solo away with just Hampton jumping behind!
Hampton catches up easily and goes past Rowsell in the final corner..
..Diggle and Doull can't counter..
..and Hampton claims the biggest win in his career! Rowsell 2nd ahead of Diggle, who might have waited for a climb popping up somewhere..
A disappointing race from a neutral point of view, since last year's road race was quite entertaining. Anyway, the "big four" made it into the break and bye bye, the race was "over" for 40 riders..
The ITT promises some more thrill and contention from the big guns: defending champion Bibby and Tennant (3rd last year) will go and try to get themselfes a NC shirt.
Last year's runner-up Stannard (ASDA) as the top-favorite though, while also Burke (Good Energy), Wiggins (Pendle) or Faiers (Good) may fancy their chances for a good result at least.
Some notable news first: we notice crosswinds about 36kmh early in the day and with Faiers having an early start, this surely is something to keep an eye on.
1h09'29" for Faiers, who easily takes a long lasting best time!
All other contenders have a late start.. time to focus on the half-time splits..
..but first, it's about time to look at the weather conditions, too! With defending champion Bibby now coming to the split, we notice those crosswinds going up to 46kmh in the meantime:
+ 25" for Bibby at half-time! That's quite a gap and the wind may well become a crucial factor today!
Also Faiers' teammate Burke obviously suffers from the strong blowing crosswinds:
+ 59" as provisional 7th at the split!
Will Faiers benefit big time from those changing conditions? Well, maybe too early to say, since Tennant actually does quite well at half-time:
+ 2" with still 23km to go for him..
Stannard though in the same range as Bibby, so maybe already losing his hopes to claim the title:
+ 23" on Faiers and therefore twenty seconds down on Tennant..
Will it come down to either Faiers or Tennant?
Jaguar's premium TT-specialists definitely ain't giving too much about the heavy wind, as he crosses the last split with a new best time:
19" ahead of Faiers now, going strong towards the victory!
Stannard down by 31 seconds and Bibby already 50 seconds slower at this point! For Stannard it's most probably about the runner-up now..
Tennant though put up a really impressive performance, as he almost catches up to Burke on the final metres!
Burke, by the way, will end up as 6th, more than a minute slower than Faiers..
..and Tennant went to an undisputed victory eventually! Beating early starter Faiers by 38" in the end.
Faiers though held off Stannard by a second, going for a strong 2nd place. Bibby (+ 1.07), Burke (1.46) or Wiggins (2.07) clearly suffered in those tricky conditions, while Tennant was the only late starter to go past Faiers.
British National Championships are held in Sheffield and an all-flat parcours this year.
