Club Races
Parnaby Scores Narrow Win
Fyans Creek Handicap
Monday 14th March 2011

	Peter Parnaby

Beautiful weather and an extra day to the weekend drew a good field of riders for the Grampians Vets 44km Fyans Creek Handicap, held last Monday.

Limit riders Trevor McDonald, Les Power and John McIntyre made good use of their 16 minute start over scratch to remain out of sight until the closing stages of the race.

Nine minute riders Tom Eldridge, Stuart King and Peter Mayo put in a valiant effort but were caught by 5 minute riders Shaun Blackie, Glenn Ford, Wayne Klauss and Peter Parnaby with 10 kilometres to go.

Combined, these two bunches became a formidable force, making the job of 2 minute riders Rod Hetherington, Drew Heard, Crystal Wemyss and Daryl Elliott much harder.

Further back, the scratch riders Frank Kean, Peter Wemyss, Sean Prins and Drew Gray put in the hard work early on, and pulled back a fair amount of time on the bunches ahead, but then after dropping one of their number started to run out of steam.

With 7 kilometres to go, the limit riders had a minute and a half over the combined 9 and 5 minute riders, who were still working strongly. Some mighty turns at the front by Shaun Blackie helped close the gap quickly, and the catch came with 2 kilometres to go.

In the final sprint, Blackie led out early, but with 250 metres to go, Stuart King made a break for the line, with Peter Parnaby on his wheel. King provided the textbook lead out for Parnaby, who made his bid in the last 30 metres to overcome the tiring King and grab the win by half a wheel. Tom Eldridge was third ahead of Glenn Ford.

Frank Kean recorded the fastest time of the day.