Le Tissier claims overall title

TOBYN HORTON took victory in the final stage of the Velo Club's four-day stage race held on the L'Eree Circuit. The race saw the riders tackle the climb of Pleinmont four times.

The first serious move of the race came as early as the first lap when Mike Dean attacked on the descent towards L'Eree and took with him Dave Gallienne, Tim Holmes and Mark Batiste.

With no immediate reaction from the bunch, the break soon gained a minute lead and started to look threatening.

Dean and Holmes were soon out in front and working well together having dropped their two companions who were quickly swept up by the chasing pack.

However, their move was doomed the moment Rob Smart stepped on the gas on the third ascent of Pleinmont taking with him Horton, Stuart Le Tissier, Tony Bleasdale, Terry Wright and Alan Rowe.

The chasers quickly picked up the leaders and set about building an advantage over the rest of the field.

It was on the fourth and final climb that Smart again launched himself towards the summit and this time only Le Tissier, Bleasdale and Horton were able to follow the move.

Meanwhile, the main group were split in half.

A small group containing Jon and Matt Osborne, Colin Ozanne and Batiste were riding strongly just ahead of a larger group of riders containing Graham Le Maitre, Aidan Stanford, Peter Miller and leading woman, Tracey Dowington.

On the final descent, the relentless attacking continued amongst the four leaders and with Le Tissier, Smart and Horton working well as a team, it was left to Bleasdale to cover all of the moves.

Finally, Horton and Le Tissier managed to break away.

Bleasdale, more concerned with protecting his position in the overall standings, was reluctant to work with Smart leaving Horton and Le Tissier to build their lead.

Approaching the finish, a surge of pace from Horton saw him inch ahead of Le Tissier for the win.

With second place, Le Tissier secured a well-deserved overall victory.

Bleasdale took the sprint for third from Smart to secure second place overall.

Rowe just pipped Wright for fifth place finishing comfortably ahead of Holmes, Dean and Lars Persson. Jon Osborne lead the next group to finish with Le Maitre leading the main bunch home some two minutes later.

Dowington finished as top woman.

In the support race, a time-trial held over one lap of the circuit, it was Nathan Baudains who showed his strength, taking the win from James Cameron by 36 seconds. James McLaughlan took third ahead of Gary Robert, Callum Hill-Smith, Ben Hall and Alex Falla.