Two national competition records fell at the Bynea CC 25-mile event staged on the fast R25/3h course near Rhigos in South Wales on Sunday.
Less than 24 hours after she had beaten her own 10-mile competition record in Yorkshire, Hayley Simmonds (AeroCoach) added the 25-mile competition record as she became the first woman to go under 50 minutes for 25 miles, clocking 49.28 to beat Julia Shaw’s 2011 best by 33 seconds.
And the event also saw the tandem competition record fall to Paralympic-bound Adam Duggleby (Secret Training CC) and Steve Bate (Para T) who clocked 43.23 to beat Michael Hutchinson and Sean Yates’ 2006 time by 16 seconds.
“I wasn’t sure how I was going because I didn’t feel fresh after setting the ten record the day before,” said Simmonds. “But I put my head down and dug deep. It’s amazing to be the first woman to go under 50 minutes, it was a real relief!”
“I felt quite sick a couple of miles in, but luckily it passed because I didn’t want to do three-quarters of the race feeling that way. I just focused on my numbers and pushed hard where in counted.
“I’ve done the course a couple of times before and I had looked at the wind speed beforehand, so I knew where to push on and where to save something. The last five kilometres drags uphill, so I knew I couldn’t be completely dead heading into that. But I was pretty spent when I finished!
“I stopped my Garmin at 49.33, and I always start it early so I was fairly sure I had the record.
“I think you could still get faster days on this course, and there are other riders who could do 49s, so I don’t think it’s going to be as safe as my 50-mile record!”
The men’s event was won by John Dewey (Team Bottrill) who clocked 46.44 to win by eight seconds from Dan Bigham (drag2zero), while Liam Maybank (Twickenham CC) was third with 47.36.
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