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13/08/08: Janet Wins National Derny Champs!
XRT-ElmyCycles' Janet continued her unbeaten run by taking the British Cycling National Derny Paced Championships in Cardiff last weekend.
The multi World and European Masters champion has never taken an elite national title, although she came close with a silver medal in the scratch race last year. Pre race favourite was Emma Trott, a full time cyclist who rides as part of the same team as Olympic gold medallist Nicole Cooke’s. She attacked early in the race, splitting the field of nine riders and leaving just four in contention for the medals. Janet was the first to get to Emma, but as soon as she had made contact, two riders came over the top of them and there was a battle for the lead. Janet, paced by ex-National Champion pacer Graham Bristow, was kept her in contention, but did not challenge until the lap board read 2 to go. The pace picked up considerably at the end and but Janet, known for her fast finish, was able to power over the top to take the win by several bike lengths. |
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13/08/08: XRT-ElmyCycles Janet Takes Four European Masters Titles
Janet Birkmyre, who rides for XRT-ElmyCycles.co.uk, took the European Masters Track Championships by storm last week, taking all four of the titles available in her age category.
The championships were held at the Manchester Velodrome, home to the 2008 World Championships and drew over 200 riders from nine European countries, including Italy, France, Germany, Ireland, Denmark and Austria. Janet, has been building up to these championships by racing at an elite level in the UK with team mate Caroline Gammel and having had a very successful season to date, she is currently the number one ranked rider in the UK. With good form and as a previous World Master, Janet was sure to be a marked rider in the bunch races, but in the first race of the championships, the points race, she showed that she is considerably stronger than the opposition by winning every sprint in the race and taking the maximum number of 25 points. In a very European line up, the silver medal went to Patrizia Spadaccini with 10 points and bronze to Petra Kluender of Germany with 8 points. The second title was the 500m time trial, where Janet just missed her goal of improving her own world record after a poor start, but with a time of 37.438 seconds she was still three seconds ahead of the silver medallist, Debbie Capewell from Great Britain. After a rest day, Janet took the sprint title, qualifying fastest and then progressing unbeaten from the sudden death round one races, through to the best of three medal ride offs. The final race was the pursuit and this was probably the closest of all the contests. After posting a good qualifying time, Janet rode off for the gold medal against the Italian, Spadaccini. In this discipline, riders start on opposite sides of the track and race over a distance of 2,000 metres. Janet took an early lead but at half distance Spadaccini had pulled level and then eased into the lead. Janet eventually overcame the Italian to win by one second recording a new PB Janet now looks forward to competing in the elite National Derny Pace Championships in Wales. |
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22/07/08: Caroline and Janet compete in National Omnium Series
Both Janet and Caroline represented XRT - www.ElmyCycles.co.uk at the final round of British Cycling’s Women’s National Omnium Track Series, held in Welwyn Garden City on Saturday.
The National Series attracts the top female domestic riders from across the UK and was particularly competitive this season, as it drew a strong contingent of Olympic Development Programme riders. The day started with a 500m time trial and Janet and Caroline threw the down gauntlet to the other riders by placing 1st and 3rd respectively. This was followed by the scratch, pursuit, sprint and finally, to round off a long day with some keenly fought battles, a points race. At the end of the day Caroline finished 5th, while Janet took the win and in doing so secured the overall National Series. Janet and Caroline will compete shoulder to shoulder together again at the National Track Championships in September. |
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18/07/08: Five out of five at the National Masters Track Championships for Elmy's Janet Birkmyre
XRT - www.ElmyCycles.co.uk rider Janet Birkmyre retained all five of her National Masters Track Cycling titles last weekend, at the Newport Velodrome.
The championships are open to riders over the age of 30 and attract over 200 cyclists from across the UK. Janet, a five times World Master, was the defending champion in all of her events and she managed a clean sweep of titles for the second consecutive year, taking her tally to 18 titles over the last 4 years. Racing was held over three days. Friday was all about sprinting, with qualifying, heats and finals all in one long day. Janet qualified second fastest in her category and then fought hard to win the sudden death final. The second day opened with the 500m TT, Janet is the World Masters record holder over this distance and showed good form to win by over a second from her nearest competitor. In the evening session on the same day, she won the Scratch race. For this race all age categories took to the track together, with placings by category to decided on position over the line. The race was unusually fast and attacking, with a decisive break getting away before half distance. Janet left her title in no doubt by winning overall. Finally on Sunday, she took the Pursuit and Points race titles to round off a busy weekend. |
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13/06/08: XRT/Elmy Cycles win the first round of the National Women’s Track Series
The first round of the national track series for women was held at Welwyn Track on 31 May and I managed to successfully walk away with the win, managing to continue to defend my championship of this elite level series. This had previously been held by cycling legend Victoria Pendleton.
The series takes the form of an omnium of five races, which require both sprint and endurance based fitness, as well as good tactical awareness. The races were: 500m time trial, Scratch Race, Pursuit, Match Sprint and finally a Points race. |
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31/05/08: Caroline takes Silver at Nationals
Caroline raced to her best result to date in the weekends' 2008 British Cycling Grass Track Championships. Held in Bitts Park, Carlisle, in the shadow of Carlisle Castle, the setting provided a suitable backdrop to an exciting days racing. Pendleton, who has held the Women's Grass Track Title on several occasions, was forced to sit out this year's event to allow for her preparations for the Beijing Olympics. Whilst the south of the Country was sitting under a blanket of wind and rain, cyclists in Carlisle enjoyed near perfect conditions for this years event as the riders lined up to compete for the title of 2008 Champion.
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29/05/08: Elmys welcomes new rider Janet Birkmyre
We are extremely proud to welcome into the XRT/Elmy Cycles Racing Team a new addition in the form of none other than one of the best female riders in the country - Janet Birkmyre! Janet has shown her incredible speed both on the road and track with a series of amazing wins and has now joined us to ride road, time trial, hard track and grass track.
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27/05/08: Elmy Cycle Team makes local news
Elmys sponsored riders made the newspaper today in the sport section when they managed to bring home first place in the Stowmarket District Mens and Womens 10 mile Time Trials. Emily and Lee both managed to win by fairly respectable margins - see the column below:
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