It appears the cobbles of Paris-Roubaix can switch to the forest tracks of Galloway in Scotland reasonably properly, as Alison Jackson (EF-Oatly-Cannondale) demonstrated on the weekend when she received the elite ladies’s British Gravel Championship race.
If she received in type, she didn’t disappoint when it got here to celebrating both, providing up one among her famend dances to mark the event.
The Canadian rider broke away with Briton Annabel Fisher (Categorized Ridley Manufacturing facility) on the climb to Loch Grannoch, staying away down the ultimate descent and into the end, the place Jackson outsprinted Fisher for the win. Amelia Mitchell (Das-Hutchinson-Brother) pipped Katie Scott (Spectra Racing) for third place, 1:44 again on the successful pair.
Whereas Jackson could have crossed the road first, Fisher claimed the title – and the purple, white and blue bands – as first Brit to complete.
For Jackson, who received Paris-Roubaix final 12 months, it was solely her second gravel race, and her first within the UK.
It wasn’t her first Scottish race although – she rode the Tour of Scotland in 2019, at which she received a stage and was second general. That race was hit by some appalling climate, which definitely wasn’t an issue at Saturday’s gravel races, which had been run off in belting sunshine.
The boys’s occasion was received by Connor Swift (Ineos Grenadiers), who dropped breakaway accomplice Cameron Mason (Cyclocross Reds) on the Loch Grannoch climb to go solo within the last kilometres and cross the road alone.
It was a welcome one-place enchancment from final 12 months’s race for the Yorkshire rider, who was outsprinted by up and coming Joe Blackmore for the title within the Kings Forest, Suffolk.
The rostrum was a household affair, with Swift’s cousin (and Ineos Grenadiers team-mate) Ben Swift ending third after being outsprinted by Toby Perry (Categorized Ridley Manufacturing facility) for second place, 2:53 again.
The occasion, organised by RedOn, was held as a part of the three-day Raiders Gravel occasion, based mostly in town of Gatehouse of Fleet in south-west Scotland. It’s the first time since its inauguration in 2021 that it has not been held within the King’s Forest, Suffolk.
RedOn was compelled to vary the venue attributable to an increase in forestry charges.
The Galloway Forest boasts a few of Britain’s greatest and most in depth gravel tracks. It is also house to one other RedOn occasion, the Gralloch, and can also be a UNESCO Biosphere and a Darkish Sky Park.
