Reports

With the May Day Bank Holiday weather reliably unreliable, the organizers of the Reading Track League Bordeaux-Paris meeting have two or three backup dates - stretching out to late September - pencilled in every year. And most years they get to use a couple of them.

Not this year, though. A strong, gusty wind made rear wheel and gear selection a challenge - and sapped the riders' strength - but the sun shone throughout and the meeting went off without a hitch.

Full results and picture gallery.

A packed programme at Palmer Park would see the six Derny Paced races interleaved with a Women’s Omnium to provide an afternoon of non-stop entertainment - with a thrilling twist at the end.

Results & photo gallery

As tradition dictates, Reading Track League’s Bordeaux-Paris tribute meeting on the May Bank Holiday weekend was postponed to the August Bank Holiday and, as tradition dictates, the rain clouds gathered in an attempt to push it into September.

Results and pictures

Mark Christian and Simon Yates of 100% Me fought off a determined effort from Alex Dowsett of Sky and Tom Murray of IG Sigma Sport to take Gold in a very fast paced National Madison Championship at the National Cycling Centre in Manchester. The afternoon session crowd were also treated to Future Stars Madison races and the qualifying session from the Sprint competition.

The sun was out for the start of the 6^th Bordeaux-Paris meeting at Reading’s Palmer Park and a strong field lined up for this unique event in the National Hard Track Endurance Series which features a 20k Scratch Race as a qualifier for a 30k Derny paced event – the top 9 riders from the Scratch moving through to the Derny Final.

Photo galleries

On the eve of the general election, there was an exceptional turn-out of 78 riders despite the cold conditions, and each race in another action-packed meet had several candidates for victory. In the search for an outright winner tonight, my vote was definitely going to the joint league leader Felix English. The in-form junior had put in a barn-storming performance last week when he won every race in which he took part, and he had clinched the final stage of the Isle of Man International Junior Tour the previous weekend.

Palmer Park was bathed in sunshine for round 10 of the Reading Track League. The first event of the night was the trackcycling Senior B and Ladies 10 lap scratch race.

Photos : Jun Aishima