I cycled the inaugural Great Manchester Cycle on Bank Holiday Monday 4th June.
I had only come across the event after seeing it promoted on Rebecca Romero’s twitter
account so thought I’d do it as training for the Chester Triathlon on 1st July. It was the UK’s largest timed cycling event, only cost a tenner and all the roads are closed to cars. It featured three distances on a 13 mile city centre loop; 52 miles for “elite and club cyclists”, 26 miles for cyclists wanting a challenge and 13 miles for a more leisurely cycle. Of course, I registered for the 52 mile distance.
The atmosphere at the start is very good. There is plenty of water available and a mechanical area to make sure your tyres are inflated.
The route starts at the Etihad Stadium and takes cyclists out towards Salford. The roads are mostly dual carriageways and include a section of Manchester’s most well known motorway, the Mancunian Way. The wide roads were essential due to the amount of cyclists, but did narrow in a mile long technical area around Salford. On the first lap I frustratingly got held up in a bottleneck before the Salford Bridge and had to queue for about four minutes to get over the bridge. After the Salford loop, the route takes you back past Old Trafford to return to the Etihad Stadium, where each cyclist records a split lap time.
Despite getting held up in Salford on my first lap, I felt really comfortable and did my first lap in 42:11. I still felt comfortable on my second and third laps which were timed 39:16 and 40:42 respectively. I faded on my last lap and did 44:18. Due to my competiveness, and fear that I’d lose time, I didn’t use the feed stations which were available at the start and half way distances each lap. It was only after the race that I found out your time at the feed stations is actually deducted from your overall finish time; certainly a lesson for next year!
I finished in 2 hours 46 minutes and 27 seconds. All finishers are awarded with a medal stating the distance they cycled, a t-shirt and the usual goodies. I’m not sure how many people entered the 52 mile distance, but the results section of the website says I got 671stwhich I was pretty pleased with. There were 7,000 cyclists who did all three distances; the events maximum capacity.
I was told by my parents and brother who came to watch, that it was a really enjoyable event to watch as a spectator too. They watched from the start line at the Etihad Stadium so got to cheer cyclists pass four times, and heard event commentary here too. There were famous cyclists too who raced, including current Olympic Individual Pursuit Gold medallist Rebecca Romero and 2009 Team Pursuit World champion Lizzie Armistead, who I actually got to meet after the race by a moment of good fortune and timing. Amongst many others, a big inspiration to me is former England and Crewe Alexandra Footballer, Geoff Thomas, who since retiring from Football has recovered from Leukemia and cycled the Tour de France, also took part.
Would I do this again? Without a doubt! Cycling over the Mancunian Way with not a car in sight was a very special and enjoyable experience. The only, very small, negative was the queue to get over the bridge in Salford on lap one, although I expect that this will be addressed next year and there was no queue at all for the subsequent laps. Due to the events success, the organisers have pledged to put the event on again next year, and I have registered for updates for when entries open. I expect that next year’s event will sell out very quickly.
For more information, visit the Great Manchester Cycle website.
Paul Barnett