ELITE and first category riders rolled away from Kempsey Community Youth Centre at the start of the iconic Worcester Trophy Race.

Seventy-one competitors tackled seven-and-a-quarter laps of a tough 11.5-mile circuit around Severn Stoke in the long-running event organised by Worcester St John’s Cycling Club.

It has a distinguished list of previous winners including Tour de France champion Sir Bradley Wiggins.

The racing was fast and furious with cyclists continually trying to break free from the fast-moving bunch.

Finally after half the distance a group of 11 established a gap on the bunch and rode away to contest the finish.

With a tough uphill finish up Severn Stoke bank and then turning towards Kinnersley it came down to a tight sprint between three.

Taking the win by a single bike length was Matthew Garthwaite from Rhino Velo ahead of Matthew Clarke from Halesowen CC and Rhys Williams from South Wales Road Development Programme.

With an average finish of nearly 27mph for the rolling 83-mile race, riders said it had been a hard, fast event.

Meanwhile, a large number of riders failed to make the start in St John’s 10-mile club time trial at Severn Stoke.

It left the league points to those who took the risk and rode in what turned out to be dry, cool conditions.

The race was won by points leader Simon Garrett in 21 minutes 43 seconds, pushing Jason Milner into second and visiting rider Nick Slim from Leisure Lakes RT into third.

Ollie Morgan and Harry Tait were fastest junior and under 16 riders in 22.56 and 26.44 respectively.

Chris Pettifer took nine seconds off his personal best which was no mean feat on a slow night.

Mark Daffin rode a cyclo-cross bike with aero-bars to record 26.11.

CLUB TIME TRIAL

Garrett 21.43, Milner 22.06, Slim 22.13, Jez Pile 22.21, Paul Guest 22.42, Morgan 22.56, Dave Walker 23.39, Marcus Hibbert 24.13, Martin Staines 24.34, Nick Bent 24.51, Jason Tait 25.40, Daffin 26.11, Anthony Huxley 26.30, Andrew Russell 26.40, Harry Tait 26.44, Pettifer 26.50, Rick Allen 27.06, Graziano Abbatiello 27.23, Dylan Perkins 27.50, Derek Morgan 29.07, Dan Grant 29.16, Paul Sobczyk 29.41, Debbie Hodson 32.56.