2026 Tour of the Reservoir: preview and startlists
The Tour of the Reservoir returns to the moorland above Derwent Reservoir this Sunday on a revised, more compact course but the same old North Pennines jeopardy: exposed roads, restless winds, repeated climbs and two National Road Series races that could splinter long before they reach Front Street.
The the Tour of the Reservoir returns to Consett this Sunday (7 June) with shorter routes, stronger storylines and the same old North Pennines jeopardy: exposed roads, restless winds, repeated climbs and two National Road Series races that could splinter long before they reach Front Street.
Here is our preview.
Featured image: Olly Hassell/SWpix.com
The British Continental’s National Road Series previews are powered by Topp Cycling.
What is it?
The Tour of the Reservoir is the country’s toughest road races, run on the exposed roads around Derwent Reservoir in the North Pennines and based out of Consett in County Durham. After a six-year absence, the race returned to the National Road Series calendar in 2025.
This year, organisers bill it as the 39th running of the open race and the 8th edition of the women’s race, with Steve Walton again leading the promotion. Last year’s winners were Adam Howell of MUC-OFF-SRCT-STORCK and Robyn Clay of DAS-Hutchinson, both taking victory on a day defined by wind, attrition and the race’s long-awaited return. Both winners receive a Mike Hodgson Memorial Trophy, named in tribute to the organiser who ran the Tour of the Reservoir from its first edition in 1988 through to 2019.
The headline change for 2026 is the course. Last year’s route produced a brutal, wind-torn race, but it also brought logistical challenges, particularly around the A68. For 2026, the route has been revised to avoid that road during the racing laps and to create what the Walton describes as a more flowing course. The races are shorter as a result, but shorter does not necessarily mean simple.
Route
Both races share the same moorland circuit of roughly 37 kilometres, ridden anti-clockwise. The women cover two laps for 96 kilometres; the open race three for 133 kilometres.
The start is neutralised out of Consett Rugby Club, south-west through Moorside and Castleside, across the A68 and out to Healeyfield Lane, where kilometre zero sits at the Muggleswick/Edmundbyers signpost.
From there the road tips downhill towards Edmundbyers — a fast, open descent over cattle grids with sheep grazing the unfenced verges. The circuit then works its way around the reservoir: through Ruffside, along School Lane towards the water, left at Barley Hill Lane and back towards Blanchland. In a change from 2025, when the race turned off before the village, this year’s route drops through the centre of Blanchland itself – a sharp 20 per cent descent. Out of Blanchland the race climbs Bale Hill and presses on over Meadows Edge, the day’s categorised high point, where the King and Queen of the Mountains primes are decided before the quick descent back towards Edmundbyers and the lap board.
After the final lap the race turns for home at Castleside, dropping onto the long, fast descent of the Waskerley Way and Healeyfield Lane, recrossing the A68 and rejoining the A692 through Castleside and Moorside. The finish comes on Front Street in Consett, on a slightly rising, fully barriered run-in to the gantry.
It is not a course that rewards drifting. There is no long climb on which to make the race in one move; instead the selection tends to come from the accumulation – the climbs to Meadows Edge, the technical descents, and above all the wind across the exposed sections, which in 2025 split the open race into echelons and produced a lead group whittled down lap by lap.
Race organiser Steve Walton’s own reading is that the race is unlikely to be decided on the Meadows Edge climb – the near-equal descent off the back tends to haul back anything but a sizeable gap – but on the rolling, exposed run around the top of the reservoir, an innocuous-looking stretch where a small lead can quickly become minutes up the road, and out of sight.
Weather
At the time of writing, the forecast is for sunny spells in the morning for the womens race and showers of the open race in the afternoon. As Topp Cycling highlights in the box below, winds should be strong enough to affect the race. The forecast matters here, but so does the way the wind behaves once it reaches the reservoir. Walton says riders last year struggled to make sense of it. “That’s really the characteristic of the race,” he said. “It just doesn’t conform. Even on a fine day, the wind seems to fall flat on the course at the top, so you think you’re on the flat but you’re actually going uphill.”
Riders to watch
Women’s race
The women’s race has lost much of the spring’s top end and feels all the more open for it. Three of the four leading riders in the National Road Series standings are absent – CiCLE Classic winner Noémie Thomson, East Cleveland winner Katie Scott and Anna Morris are all off the startlist – while RedChilli Bikes O’Shea Racing are the only women’s UCI Continental team not represented on the provisional start list. What remains is not a weaker race so much as a less predictable one: no obvious controlling force, fewer dominant blocs, and several riders with a plausible route to victory if they read the weather, the climbs and the exposed roads correctly.
What it does have is the series leader. Morven Yeoman arrives as the obvious reference point for DAS-Hutchinson, top of the women’s National Road Series standings after winning the Rapha Lincoln Grand Prix and finishing third at the CiCLE Classic. She did not start here last year, but the fit looks obvious: Reservoir rewards durability, repeatability and the ability to keep making efforts long after the race has stopped feeling orderly. DAS do not have the full weight of their spring line-up around her, but they are not short of cards. Josie Knight, fifth at Lincoln, brings Olympic team-pursuit power to a race where force counts for plenty, while Lucy Lee, seventh at Lincoln and fourth here last year, gives them one of the strongest pieces of course-specific evidence in the field.
Morven Yeoman celebrates winning the 2026 Rapha Lincoln Grand Prix. Image: Milan Josy/The British Continental
The deepest team may be Handsling Alba Development Road Team. Anna Flynn and Beth Morrow were second and third at East Cleveland, Madeline Cooper was sixth at the CiCLE Classic, and Kate Richardson, seventh here in 2025, brings a proven engine for a race that tends to become more about endurance and positioning than a single decisive climb. Flynn is particularly interesting in this context. She was active early at Reservoir last year, taking third on the opening prime behind Robyn Clay and Lauren Dickson, and while she faded later, that willingness to race the climb rather than merely endure it feels relevant here.
Smurfit Westrock Cycling Team also have to be treated as one of the key blocs. Jo Tindley was fifth here last year after making the decisive early move, and that is one of the clearest course-specific markers in the field. She is joined by Elena Day, 14th here last year. Tindley’s presence matters because Reservoir often rewards the rider who senses the decisive split before it looks decisive. If Smurfit get that timing right again, they could be central to how the race is made.
Lily Martin is too consistent to ignore. The Loughborough Lightning rider has been one of the most reliable under-23s of the spring, winning Banbury Star and the BUCS Road Race Championship, as well as finishing eighth at the CiCLE Classic. She is an excellent climber, so should thrive when the road heads uphill. In a similar mould, Amy Henchoz is another obvious contender. The Paralloy RT rider has been a fixture near the front all spring, with second at Capernwray, sixth at Lincoln and a place inside the top ten of the series standings.
Ruby Oakes at the 2026 Rapha Lincoln Grand Prix. Image: Milan Josy/The British Continental
Ruby Oakes has had one of the stronger springs in the domestic peloton, with third at Capernwray and fourth at Lincoln, while her Phoebe Roche gives FTP-Fulfil The Potential-Racing another live option after finishing second at the London Dynamo Road Race last weekend.
Lucy Harris deserves to be treated as a contender in her own right. Now with DRAFT Racing, she was ninth here last year and has already shown the kind of diesel strength this course tends to reward. Kim Baptista, newly signed with DRAFT, is another outside name worth noting. Fifth in the series standings, she finished 9th at the East Cleveland and is suited to tough grippy courses like this.
There is also a particularly strong Great Britain junior team on the startlist, and it should not be treated as a development footnote. Melanie Rowe has the clearest domestic marker, having finished second at the CiCLE Classic and sitting inside the series top six. Phoebe Taylor has gone well on punchy terrain this year, with ninth at the Clásica de Jaén Nation’s Cup race, 15th at Piccolo Trofeo Alfredo Binda, fourth at Capernwray and 15th overall at Omloop van Borsele. Peggy Knox, still only a first-year junior, is one of the brightest British prospects in the age group, with fifth at the junior Tour of Flanders, 12th at In Flanders Fields and 18th overall at Omloop van Borsele. The question is not whether the juniors have the talent; it is whether they can turn that talent into positioning, patience and race craft against senior riders who know how quickly Reservoir can punish a mistake.
Open race
The open race has a different centre of gravity from last year. The 2025 edition was shaped by MUC-OFF-SRCT-STORCK’s numerical strength, with Adam Howell and Alex Beldon delivering a one-two after a race repeatedly torn apart by North Pennine crosswinds. Howell and Beldon are absent this time, and the old MUC-OFF structure is gone, but several of the riders who mattered in that brutally selective race return: George Radcliffe, third last year; Edward Morgan, fifth; Tom Martin, seventh.
The race does have the National Road Series leader. Tom Armstrong arrives for Wheelbase CabTech Castelli after moving into the lead at Lincoln, where he finished third behind Ollie Wood and Jack Rootkin-Gray after Danylo Riwnyj punctured out of the winning move. Armstrong’s spring already included second at the CiCLE Classic and 10th at East Cleveland, which gives him form across two very different hard races. Reservoir is different again, but it asks many of the same questions: positioning, repeatability, strength in the wind, and the ability to keep riding when the race has already begun to unravel.
Tom Armstrong and Tom Martin at the 2026 Rapha Lincoln Grand Prix. Image: Milan Josy/The British Continental
Wheelbase also look like the strongest collective. Tom Martin is the most obvious course-specific card: second at East Cleveland behind Jowett, a recent Rás stage winner, and seventh here last year after helping force the first decisive echelon. Tim Shoreman adds another layer, arriving after winning stage two of the Rás Tailteann and wearing yellow in Ireland, while Armstrong gives the team the Series leader’s jersey and a rider with the authority to sit tight while others commit. On paper, this is the clearest controlling force in the race.
The main counterweight to Wheelbase may be JAKROO Handsling Racing. Alex Franks is second in the National Road Series after third at East Cleveland and points at Lincoln, while Oliver Dawson brings a different kind of form, including fourth at the CiCLE Classic and recent strong racing in France. Harrison Dainty gives them another rider with repeatable domestic form after second at the Danum Trophy, 11th at CiCLE and seventh at Lincoln.
Lucas Jowett should be treated as one of the central contenders. The MyPad Racing p/b ONDO Sports rider won East Cleveland from the early break, powering away from Martin and Alex Franks on Saltburn Bank, and left that first National Road Series round as the Series leader. Lincoln did not go his way, but he still sits third in the National Road Series picture, behind Armstrong and Franks.
George Radcliffe is the most obvious course-specific outsider. Third last year, he was the rider who almost turned the run-in into the winning move, attacking into the cross-tailwind and still leading into Consett before Howell and Beldon swept past within sight of the line. Now riding for Atom 6 – Cycleur de Luxe – Auto Stroo Continental Team, few riders on the start list know more clearly what a winning Reservoir move looks and feels like.
Edward Morgan deserves more weight than a passing mention. Fifth here last year for MUC-OFF-SRCT-STORCK, he was part of the team that helped bring the race back together after Radcliffe’s late attack. He now races in France with CC Villeneuve Saint-Germain, and his recent record points to a rider comfortable in hard, attritional racing: second on stage four of the Tour de la Manche last week, fourth overall in the same race, and fourth at last year’s Rutland-Melton CiCLE Classic.
Danylo Riwnyj at the Rapha Lincoln Grand Prix. Image: Milan Josy/The British Continental
Danylo Riwnyj is another rider whose profile suits the course. He was 13th here last year, won the Rás Mumhan in April after victory at the Wally Gimber in his first race of the season, He was also part of the decisive late move at Lincoln before puncturing out of contention, which makes the result sheet a poor guide to how strong he was that day. He is unlikely to be given much rope, but Reservoir is often too chaotic for every dangerous rider to be controlled.
Ride Revolution Coaching bring the The British Continental road race rankings leader in Clay Davies. His season has been built on accumulation rather than one defining result: fifth at the Wally Gimber, seventh at East Cleveland, second at the GA Bennett Road Race, third at London Dynamo and fifth at the Eastern Road Race Championships. That sort of repeatability should count at Reservoir. Josh Housley also belongs in the conversation after fifth at East Cleveland.
DAS Richardsons also bring depth for a race that may reward numbers as much as hierarchy. William Perrett has already won the GA Bennett Road Race this season, Jordan Giles was sixth at East Cleveland, and Olly Curd won the Jock Wadley.
Lewis Tinsley gives BCC Race Team one of the strongest under-23 cards in the field. He has been consistently near the front this spring: third overall at the Peak 2 Day, third at the Danum Trophy, sixth at Lincoln and second at the East and West Midlands Regional Championships. He was also in the front echelon here last year before eventually finishing 27th, which gives him some direct evidence on a race where first-time misjudgements can be expensive. Alex Murphy is worth inclusion too. The Stolen Goat 4Endurance under-23 has quietly built one of the more complete domestic springs in the field, with victory at the Portsdown Classic, fourth at Jock Wadley and 12th at East Cleveland.
There is a broader under-23 thread running through the start list. Elliott Colyer, now with Aero CLCTV Race Team, has won the Totnes Vire overall, while Deetray Jarrett, racing with Vigo-Rias Baixas, has already won Capernwray and finished second at both Gifford and Chitterne. Finally, Thomas Mein is an intriguing name. Best known for cyclo-cross and off-road strength, the Hope Factory Racing rider has the repeated-power profile that could become relevant quickly on exposed, uneven roads.
Timings
Race
Start (neutralised roll-out)
Estimated finish
Alexandra Tour of the Reservoir (women)
08:50
approx. 11:30
Tour of the Reservoir (open)
13:30
approx. 17:00–17:25
How to follow
The British Continental will be covering both races through our Instagram. Full reports and results from both will follow on The British Continental.
The the Tour of the Reservoir returns to Consett this Sunday (7 June) with shorter routes, stronger storylines and the same old North Pennines jeopardy: exposed roads, restless winds, repeated climbs and two National Road Series races that could splinter long before they reach Front Street.
Here is our preview.
Featured image: Olly Hassell/SWpix.com
The British Continental’s National Road Series previews are powered by Topp Cycling.
What is it?
The Tour of the Reservoir is the country’s toughest road races, run on the exposed roads around Derwent Reservoir in the North Pennines and based out of Consett in County Durham. After a six-year absence, the race returned to the National Road Series calendar in 2025.
This year, organisers bill it as the 39th running of the open race and the 8th edition of the women’s race, with Steve Walton again leading the promotion. Last year’s winners were Adam Howell of MUC-OFF-SRCT-STORCK and Robyn Clay of DAS-Hutchinson, both taking victory on a day defined by wind, attrition and the race’s long-awaited return. Both winners receive a Mike Hodgson Memorial Trophy, named in tribute to the organiser who ran the Tour of the Reservoir from its first edition in 1988 through to 2019.
The headline change for 2026 is the course. Last year’s route produced a brutal, wind-torn race, but it also brought logistical challenges, particularly around the A68. For 2026, the route has been revised to avoid that road during the racing laps and to create what the Walton describes as a more flowing course. The races are shorter as a result, but shorter does not necessarily mean simple.
Route
Both races share the same moorland circuit of roughly 37 kilometres, ridden anti-clockwise. The women cover two laps for 96 kilometres; the open race three for 133 kilometres.
The start is neutralised out of Consett Rugby Club, south-west through Moorside and Castleside, across the A68 and out to Healeyfield Lane, where kilometre zero sits at the Muggleswick/Edmundbyers signpost.
From there the road tips downhill towards Edmundbyers — a fast, open descent over cattle grids with sheep grazing the unfenced verges. The circuit then works its way around the reservoir: through Ruffside, along School Lane towards the water, left at Barley Hill Lane and back towards Blanchland. In a change from 2025, when the race turned off before the village, this year’s route drops through the centre of Blanchland itself – a sharp 20 per cent descent. Out of Blanchland the race climbs Bale Hill and presses on over Meadows Edge, the day’s categorised high point, where the King and Queen of the Mountains primes are decided before the quick descent back towards Edmundbyers and the lap board.
After the final lap the race turns for home at Castleside, dropping onto the long, fast descent of the Waskerley Way and Healeyfield Lane, recrossing the A68 and rejoining the A692 through Castleside and Moorside. The finish comes on Front Street in Consett, on a slightly rising, fully barriered run-in to the gantry.
It is not a course that rewards drifting. There is no long climb on which to make the race in one move; instead the selection tends to come from the accumulation – the climbs to Meadows Edge, the technical descents, and above all the wind across the exposed sections, which in 2025 split the open race into echelons and produced a lead group whittled down lap by lap.
Race organiser Steve Walton’s own reading is that the race is unlikely to be decided on the Meadows Edge climb – the near-equal descent off the back tends to haul back anything but a sizeable gap – but on the rolling, exposed run around the top of the reservoir, an innocuous-looking stretch where a small lead can quickly become minutes up the road, and out of sight.
Weather
At the time of writing, the forecast is for sunny spells in the morning for the womens race and showers of the open race in the afternoon. As Topp Cycling highlights in the box below, winds should be strong enough to affect the race. The forecast matters here, but so does the way the wind behaves once it reaches the reservoir. Walton says riders last year struggled to make sense of it. “That’s really the characteristic of the race,” he said. “It just doesn’t conform. Even on a fine day, the wind seems to fall flat on the course at the top, so you think you’re on the flat but you’re actually going uphill.”
Riders to watch
Women’s race
The women’s race has lost much of the spring’s top end and feels all the more open for it. Three of the four leading riders in the National Road Series standings are absent – CiCLE Classic winner Noémie Thomson, East Cleveland winner Katie Scott and Anna Morris are all off the startlist – while RedChilli Bikes O’Shea Racing are the only women’s UCI Continental team not represented on the provisional start list. What remains is not a weaker race so much as a less predictable one: no obvious controlling force, fewer dominant blocs, and several riders with a plausible route to victory if they read the weather, the climbs and the exposed roads correctly.
What it does have is the series leader. Morven Yeoman arrives as the obvious reference point for DAS-Hutchinson, top of the women’s National Road Series standings after winning the Rapha Lincoln Grand Prix and finishing third at the CiCLE Classic. She did not start here last year, but the fit looks obvious: Reservoir rewards durability, repeatability and the ability to keep making efforts long after the race has stopped feeling orderly. DAS do not have the full weight of their spring line-up around her, but they are not short of cards. Josie Knight, fifth at Lincoln, brings Olympic team-pursuit power to a race where force counts for plenty, while Lucy Lee, seventh at Lincoln and fourth here last year, gives them one of the strongest pieces of course-specific evidence in the field.
The deepest team may be Handsling Alba Development Road Team. Anna Flynn and Beth Morrow were second and third at East Cleveland, Madeline Cooper was sixth at the CiCLE Classic, and Kate Richardson, seventh here in 2025, brings a proven engine for a race that tends to become more about endurance and positioning than a single decisive climb. Flynn is particularly interesting in this context. She was active early at Reservoir last year, taking third on the opening prime behind Robyn Clay and Lauren Dickson, and while she faded later, that willingness to race the climb rather than merely endure it feels relevant here.
Smurfit Westrock Cycling Team also have to be treated as one of the key blocs. Jo Tindley was fifth here last year after making the decisive early move, and that is one of the clearest course-specific markers in the field. She is joined by Elena Day, 14th here last year. Tindley’s presence matters because Reservoir often rewards the rider who senses the decisive split before it looks decisive. If Smurfit get that timing right again, they could be central to how the race is made.
Lily Martin is too consistent to ignore. The Loughborough Lightning rider has been one of the most reliable under-23s of the spring, winning Banbury Star and the BUCS Road Race Championship, as well as finishing eighth at the CiCLE Classic. She is an excellent climber, so should thrive when the road heads uphill. In a similar mould, Amy Henchoz is another obvious contender. The Paralloy RT rider has been a fixture near the front all spring, with second at Capernwray, sixth at Lincoln and a place inside the top ten of the series standings.
Ruby Oakes has had one of the stronger springs in the domestic peloton, with third at Capernwray and fourth at Lincoln, while her Phoebe Roche gives FTP-Fulfil The Potential-Racing another live option after finishing second at the London Dynamo Road Race last weekend.
Lucy Harris deserves to be treated as a contender in her own right. Now with DRAFT Racing, she was ninth here last year and has already shown the kind of diesel strength this course tends to reward. Kim Baptista, newly signed with DRAFT, is another outside name worth noting. Fifth in the series standings, she finished 9th at the East Cleveland and is suited to tough grippy courses like this.
There is also a particularly strong Great Britain junior team on the startlist, and it should not be treated as a development footnote. Melanie Rowe has the clearest domestic marker, having finished second at the CiCLE Classic and sitting inside the series top six. Phoebe Taylor has gone well on punchy terrain this year, with ninth at the Clásica de Jaén Nation’s Cup race, 15th at Piccolo Trofeo Alfredo Binda, fourth at Capernwray and 15th overall at Omloop van Borsele. Peggy Knox, still only a first-year junior, is one of the brightest British prospects in the age group, with fifth at the junior Tour of Flanders, 12th at In Flanders Fields and 18th overall at Omloop van Borsele. The question is not whether the juniors have the talent; it is whether they can turn that talent into positioning, patience and race craft against senior riders who know how quickly Reservoir can punish a mistake.
Open race
The open race has a different centre of gravity from last year. The 2025 edition was shaped by MUC-OFF-SRCT-STORCK’s numerical strength, with Adam Howell and Alex Beldon delivering a one-two after a race repeatedly torn apart by North Pennine crosswinds. Howell and Beldon are absent this time, and the old MUC-OFF structure is gone, but several of the riders who mattered in that brutally selective race return: George Radcliffe, third last year; Edward Morgan, fifth; Tom Martin, seventh.
The race does have the National Road Series leader. Tom Armstrong arrives for Wheelbase CabTech Castelli after moving into the lead at Lincoln, where he finished third behind Ollie Wood and Jack Rootkin-Gray after Danylo Riwnyj punctured out of the winning move. Armstrong’s spring already included second at the CiCLE Classic and 10th at East Cleveland, which gives him form across two very different hard races. Reservoir is different again, but it asks many of the same questions: positioning, repeatability, strength in the wind, and the ability to keep riding when the race has already begun to unravel.
Wheelbase also look like the strongest collective. Tom Martin is the most obvious course-specific card: second at East Cleveland behind Jowett, a recent Rás stage winner, and seventh here last year after helping force the first decisive echelon. Tim Shoreman adds another layer, arriving after winning stage two of the Rás Tailteann and wearing yellow in Ireland, while Armstrong gives the team the Series leader’s jersey and a rider with the authority to sit tight while others commit. On paper, this is the clearest controlling force in the race.
The main counterweight to Wheelbase may be JAKROO Handsling Racing. Alex Franks is second in the National Road Series after third at East Cleveland and points at Lincoln, while Oliver Dawson brings a different kind of form, including fourth at the CiCLE Classic and recent strong racing in France. Harrison Dainty gives them another rider with repeatable domestic form after second at the Danum Trophy, 11th at CiCLE and seventh at Lincoln.
Lucas Jowett should be treated as one of the central contenders. The MyPad Racing p/b ONDO Sports rider won East Cleveland from the early break, powering away from Martin and Alex Franks on Saltburn Bank, and left that first National Road Series round as the Series leader. Lincoln did not go his way, but he still sits third in the National Road Series picture, behind Armstrong and Franks.
George Radcliffe is the most obvious course-specific outsider. Third last year, he was the rider who almost turned the run-in into the winning move, attacking into the cross-tailwind and still leading into Consett before Howell and Beldon swept past within sight of the line. Now riding for Atom 6 – Cycleur de Luxe – Auto Stroo Continental Team, few riders on the start list know more clearly what a winning Reservoir move looks and feels like.
Edward Morgan deserves more weight than a passing mention. Fifth here last year for MUC-OFF-SRCT-STORCK, he was part of the team that helped bring the race back together after Radcliffe’s late attack. He now races in France with CC Villeneuve Saint-Germain, and his recent record points to a rider comfortable in hard, attritional racing: second on stage four of the Tour de la Manche last week, fourth overall in the same race, and fourth at last year’s Rutland-Melton CiCLE Classic.
Danylo Riwnyj is another rider whose profile suits the course. He was 13th here last year, won the Rás Mumhan in April after victory at the Wally Gimber in his first race of the season, He was also part of the decisive late move at Lincoln before puncturing out of contention, which makes the result sheet a poor guide to how strong he was that day. He is unlikely to be given much rope, but Reservoir is often too chaotic for every dangerous rider to be controlled.
Ride Revolution Coaching bring the The British Continental road race rankings leader in Clay Davies. His season has been built on accumulation rather than one defining result: fifth at the Wally Gimber, seventh at East Cleveland, second at the GA Bennett Road Race, third at London Dynamo and fifth at the Eastern Road Race Championships. That sort of repeatability should count at Reservoir. Josh Housley also belongs in the conversation after fifth at East Cleveland.
DAS Richardsons also bring depth for a race that may reward numbers as much as hierarchy. William Perrett has already won the GA Bennett Road Race this season, Jordan Giles was sixth at East Cleveland, and Olly Curd won the Jock Wadley.
Lewis Tinsley gives BCC Race Team one of the strongest under-23 cards in the field. He has been consistently near the front this spring: third overall at the Peak 2 Day, third at the Danum Trophy, sixth at Lincoln and second at the East and West Midlands Regional Championships. He was also in the front echelon here last year before eventually finishing 27th, which gives him some direct evidence on a race where first-time misjudgements can be expensive. Alex Murphy is worth inclusion too. The Stolen Goat 4Endurance under-23 has quietly built one of the more complete domestic springs in the field, with victory at the Portsdown Classic, fourth at Jock Wadley and 12th at East Cleveland.
There is a broader under-23 thread running through the start list. Elliott Colyer, now with Aero CLCTV Race Team, has won the Totnes Vire overall, while Deetray Jarrett, racing with Vigo-Rias Baixas, has already won Capernwray and finished second at both Gifford and Chitterne. Finally, Thomas Mein is an intriguing name. Best known for cyclo-cross and off-road strength, the Hope Factory Racing rider has the repeated-power profile that could become relevant quickly on exposed, uneven roads.
Timings
How to follow
The British Continental will be covering both races through our Instagram. Full reports and results from both will follow on The British Continental.
Provisional startlists
Women’s race
Open race
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