John Levison reports: A well known Tour de France cyclist of recent years may have written “It’s not about the bike” but, today at least, there’s no doubting that the bike played a major part in determining the Dambuster’s winners. While rain threatened, and briefly fell for ten minutes, athletes were thankful that the thunder and lightning of Friday was not present on race morning. Cool conditions, therefore, provided a perfect opportunity for all to race hard and fair.

Dambuster represented the second chance this year to qualify for the 2007 Age Group World Championships in Hamburg, but was also a double-header, with slots available for Vancouver 2008 as well. In combination with an already popular event, it’s not surprising this was another sell out. To cope with increased numbers, there were a few changes for 2007 – the ladies had a separate transition area above the men, while the bike course was slightly altered, removing a relative back road through a village, following the completion of the Oakham bypass. To my mind, these are both changes for the better and only improve the event.

First waves left the shore at around 6:55 am, long before which announcer Sibs was in full flow with enough facts and figures to satisfy even a ‘statto’ like me, while the music kept playing. Four hours later she was still going strong and was responsible for many a sprint finish as she encouraged (!) athletes to make every second count. Excellent job, and well appreciated by those of us spectating.

The ladies were split into two waves, with the fastest swimmers all coming from the first one. Eloise Crowley, who raced elite at Windsor last week, just headed out Rhian Roxborough (World’s medallist from Lausanne), Charmaine Wheeler (Team Viper) and Emma-Kate Lidbury (Oxford Tri). They had a minute gap on the chasers. Almost two minutes down at this point was Felicity Hart, who was just behind eventual second place finisher, Lindsay Smith.

All change on the bike as Hart, who recently finished fifth in the National ‘25’ Championships showed her class on two wheels, recording (yet again), the day’s fastest bike split (1:07:24). Behind her, Lindsay Smith also rode very strongly to join Rhian and Emma-Kate, and all three exited T2 together, two minutes down on Felicity. A solid 38-minute run was enough for Felicity to take the win, and prove she was back to form after a recent virus, followed by Lindsay, Emma-Kate and Rhian respectively.

From the second wave, another strong cyclist, Ruth Hutton (SLH Tri Club) in the 40-44 category recorded the third fastest ride of the day (1:10:32) to be a comfortable Age Group winner, and take fifth overall. Speaking to her afterwards, she mentioned that she would have liked to have started in the first wave, to give her more athletes to chase on the bike, which is her strength. Hopefully she will take up her spot for Hamburg, as I genuinely think she is a medal contender at the Worlds.

For the men, well, it was the continuation of what is proving to be a great season for Daniel Corner (Arctic Shorter-Rochford). He’s been destroying fields of late in the South of the country, at Hillingdon, Milton Keynes and Hampton amongst others. Today he proved he could do it on a National level as well, finishing a resounding four minutes clear. While he started in the second wave, he was actually first across the line. As with the ladies winner, his 1:01:29 bike time was clearly the fastest of the day, and he’s hardly shabby on the swim and run either (19th and 3rd respectively). Behind him, the 30-34 Age Group also provided the next three finishers, in Richard Laidlow, Mark Couldwell and Dale Grassby. Pretty tough qualifying in that Age Group then! Dale also took the fastest swim of the day, while Mark recorded the fastest run.

Windsor winner Laurence Harding, who combines triathlon with time trials for the Agisko-Viner team, was very disappointed to puncture just five miles into the race. After a great swim, it would have been interesting to see how his biking matched up with Daniel Corner. Worse still, he hadn’t planned to take part in any of the other qualifiers, so that could well have blown his chances for Hamburg. In his absence, Mark Hirsh took a clear win in the 40-44 Age Group.

Many of the field will now be waiting anxiously to see if they have done enough to qualify for Hamburg and/or Vancouver, and will have their eyes peeled on the BTF website this week. Overall, another excellent event from the crew at PaceSetter Events and two very worthy winners. Next stop on the qualifying trail is Pembroke on 1st July.