CLITHEROE postman Dave Ebbrell of the Blackburn and District CTC, became the first East Lancashire racing cyclist ever to beat 30 miles per hour in a time trial on the road.

He set the mark at the weekend when he clocked a very impressive time of 19mins 46secs in the Barrow Central Wheelers 10-mile event on the fast Levens, near Kendal, course.

This gave Dave fourth place to overall winner Peter Smith of Carlisle who returned 19mins 17secs on a hot Saturday afternoon with little wind when many of the 160 entrants returned personal best performances.

Of the other riders from East Lancashire, Andy Gates of Barrowford and Team Lusso was next best in 20mins 18secs followed by Graham Waddington (Pendle Forest) 20min 40secs, Mick Ellerton (Clayton Velo) 20mins 40secs, Peter Greenwood (Clayton Velo) 20min 48secs, Jon Purdy (Lancs Road Club) 20mins 53secs, Neil Cooper (NLRC) 21mins 02secs, Jason Bateman (Pendle Forest) 21.03, Fraser Snape (NLRC) 21.14, Keith Turner (NLRC) 21.18, Dave Brown (NLRC) 21.31, Peter Haigh (Nelson Wheelers) 21.32, John Leach (Rossendale Road Club) 21.55, Martin Smithson (Spintech) 22.18, Bob Jones (NLRC) 22.25, Ralph Pilkington (NLRC) 24.42.

In the separate ladies event, Sharon Padley of the Rossendale Road Club improved to 23 minutes exactly, Sue Cheetham of Blackburn and District CTC reduced her previous best time by over a minute to 23mins 25secs and relative newcomer to the sport, Sharon Smith of the North Lancs Road Club reduced her best time by three minutes to 26mins 27secs.

Many of the above will be hoping for an equally good day for the final event on this course this season a week on Saturday.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.