The Lincoln GP is one of the toughest races on the premier calendar here in the UK and it attracts some of the best riders from the UK and the continent who all want to bag the win. Team Probikekit.com had 5 riders in their team this year, James Smith, Chris Lobb, Richard Wilkinson, Jamie Howard and Nick Boost.

There was a strong turnout from Rapha Condor, Pendragon Kalas, Motorpoint, Sky, Endura, Sigma Sport, Raleigh and the Irish National team.

The Lincoln GP is 11 laps around Lincoln with a cobbled climb up through the town centre – the climb about 500 yards of bumpy hell with the best chance for survival being the gutter at the edges of the road. Riding this climb is tough because it’s such a bone shaker, you need to ride the gutter if possible and with such tiny gutter space, you need to be out front to get a chance – otherwise it’s just a massive cycle-jam. After the climb the course flattens out and winds around through the top of town, the pace picking up instantly as the riders hit the big ring the second their off the cobbles and hurtling on to the flat sections and decent out of Lincoln.

This race is not for the faint hearted either, blink and your out the back, the only chance to stay on is to ride hard and stay as far up to the front as you can. Getting stuck too far back means getting binned on the climb as there’s only a few places on the course to make up places as the pace picks up rapidly after the climb.

The atmosphere with the cheering crowds around the course is amazing, along with the closed roads it gives this race a real continental flavour.

For most of the Probikekit riders, this was the first Premier Calendar so it was a trial by fire. Richard had ridden it before and rode as the team captain, Chris Lobb rolled his tub on the 2^nd lap and came off – no serious injury, then James and Jamie missed the big moves after getting caught up in the mayhem and got black flagged on the 8^th climb. Wilkinson finished in the 4^th bunch on the road – a hard, hard race with a fantastic atmosphere. Better luck next year

Results:

1^st Chris Newton (Rapha Condor)

2^nd Phil Lavery (Ireland)

3^rd Simon Richardson (Sigma Sport Specialised)

Unfortunately our 4th cat trooper Chris was not in the race this year and nor will he ever be. His claim that he should be allowed on the grounds of his being born in the county of Lincolnshire have luckily for him fallen on deaf ears. He would most certainly have suffered miserably and it could have put him off cycling for life. More from our weekend warrior soon.