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2026 GIANT Tugby Ronde van Wymeswold: day one report and results

Nicola Quaye (360cycling) leads the women's race after day one of the 2026 GIANT Tugby Ronde van Wymeswold, her morning time-trial win surviving an afternoon road stage she lost at the line to Ruby Oakes (FTP–Fulfil The Potential Racing). In the open race, Adam Lewis (APS Pro Cycling) went clear inside the final five kilometres and stayed away to take the stage and the lead.

Nicola Quaye (360cycling) won the women’s opening time trial at the 2026 GIANT Tugby Ronde van Wymeswold on Saturday 20 June and carried the overall lead through a tense afternoon road stage, where Ruby Oakes (FTP–Fulfil The Potential Racing) edged her in a close sprint. In the open race, Adam Lewis (APS Pro Cycling) struck from a seven-rider move inside the final five kilometres to take the stage and the race lead.

Featured image: Gary Hibbert

Report

Women’s race

Stage 1 | Time trial

Rain greeted the women’s field for the opening leg, an 8.3-kilometre individual time trial out of Coalville Wheelers’ base near Griffydam on Saturday 20 June. Ridden on road bikes over a course flat enough that the gaps would come down to pacing and nerve on greasy roads.

Quaye. Image: Gary Hibbert

Fastest of all was Nicola Quaye. The 19-year-old stopped the clock at 12 minutes and three seconds, six seconds clear of the field, on a leaderboard that spoke as much of youth as of speed. Aalia Clay (camsmajaco) was second, with fellow juniors Phoebe Taylor (Shibden Apex RT) and Mabli Phillips (Great Britain) third and fourth, at 24 and 27 seconds respectively. Ruby Oakes (FTP–Fulfil The Potential Racing), the pre-race form pick, was fifth at 41 seconds.

For Quaye, it was a first national-level win, and a considerable one, building on her promising early-season form. Her best result before Saturday was tenth at April’s East Cleveland Classic. She would start the afternoon road race in the leader’s jersey.

Stage 2 | Road race

The afternoon brought the first of the weekend’s two road races, six laps and 87 kilometres of a new rolling circuit around Breedon on the Hill. For the women it was the harder half of a day’s double, the morning’s effort against the clock still in the legs, and with no bonus seconds anywhere in this year’s race, anyone wanting to move on the overall had to do it on the road rather than at the sprints.

The circuit did not make that easy. Nothing on the lap climbs hard enough to force a selection on its own, and the bunch stayed together through the opening laps, the racing shaped less by attacks than by the Verus sprints dotted every couple of laps. Georgia Lancaster took the first of them for Loughborough Lightning; Millie Thomson (Solas Cycling) answered at the second.

Image: Gary Hibbert

The bunch stayed together into the final lap, but the finale was not the straightforward sprint it had threatened to become. On the run to the line three riders edged clear, and Quaye, wary of the lead she had built that morning, went after them over the closing rise rather than wait.

She caught them, and the sprint that followed was desperately close — close enough that Quaye crossed the line unsure whether she had done enough. It was Oakes, though, who had edged it, the pre-race favourite taking the stage ahead of Quaye, with Phoebe Taylor third.

The front group came home on the same time, so with no bonus seconds on offer, Quaye carried the overall lead into Sunday. Lancaster leads the Verus points classification after two stages on 12, with Thomson second on 10.

Quaye’s afternoon had been more eventful than the result let on. The time trial, she said, had been her main target for the weekend.

“After the time trial I was hoping for a good result, but I wasn’t depending on it, having put it all out on the road during the TT — that was my goal coming into this race,” she told The British Continental. “It’s my first stage race since youth racing. I’ve been out of it for four years, and it’s only my fourth race in the UK since I’ve been back: Pimbo, East Cleveland, Lincoln, and this is my first National B too.”

Oakes pips Quaye. Image: Gary Hibbert

The road stage then brought an early scare. “When we started stage two I was comfortable in the group until the speed bumps on lap two, where I had my front wheel taken out,” she said. “I hit the bump, my hands slipped off and I got winded as I hit the handlebars, and my knee was scraped by the front chainring. My chain came off, but luckily I managed to get it back on and sprint back to the group. That definitely wasn’t something I’d anticipated, so I put all my focus on the final sprint rather than the points.”

That decision shaped the finish. “Coming along the last straight, where the TT started, I noticed three girls off the front, and I thought that could threaten my GC, so I decided I’d attack up the hill and focus on catching them to close the gap,” she said. “I fully expected everyone to fly past me on the straight, so I got past them and put everything into it.

“I’m looking forward to tomorrow, but no massive expectations. I’ve already done far more than I thought I could, and I’m very happy overall.”

Open race

Stage 1 | Road race

Where the women’s morning had been cautious and wet, the open field that set off at 11am found drier roads, 21 degrees and only light winds — and raced accordingly. Over eight laps and 117 kilometres of the Breedon circuit the attacks came from the gun, but for much of the first half nothing was allowed to settle: move after move went and came back, none gaining serious time.

The points, at least, found a clear owner. Cameron McLaren (TAAP Kalas) took the first intermediate sprint and then the second, enough to lead the Verus classification at the end of the stage. A four-rider move, Schils–Doltcini and Foran CT among the teams represented, briefly carried 20 seconds before the bunch reeled it back in.

The break. Image: Gary Hibbert

The race finally broke with around three laps left, when seven riders forced the decisive split: Adam Lewis (APS Pro Cycling), Oliver Dawson (JAKROO Handsling Racing), Callum Laborde (Ornata Factory Racing), Josh Housley (Ride Revolution Coaching), Oscar Hutchings (Schils–Doltcini Racing Team), Danylo Riwnyj (Foran CT) and Dan Barnes (Wold Top Pactimo). On a circuit with no climb long enough to thin the group, it was the strongest collection of the day, and it stayed away.

It also stayed together — right up to the point Lewis decided otherwise. One of the most experienced riders in the move, and a winner only last month at the East and West Midlands championships on roads in the same corner of the country, the Walsall climber went clear with about five kilometres to go and was not seen again.

“I made a move with around 5km to go with no response,” he told The British Continental afterwards. “From there it was head down to the finish.” On Sunday, he offered only that he would “assess the situation after the morning TT.”

Image: Gary Hibbert

Behind him, the remnants of the break came in scattered rather than together. Housley took second at 23 seconds, with Laborde third at 29 seconds. Barnes was fourth, just ahead of Riwnyj, Dawson and Hutchings.

Lewis’s solo win leaves him in the open lead going into Sunday’s time trial and closing road stage.

Results

Women’s race

Open race


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