Shugborough Hall will this weekend provide a stately backdrop to the second day of the inaugural Staffordshire Cycling Festival, with the action starting on the streets of the county town on Friday evening with the fourth edition of the HMT Stafford GP.
Double Olympic team pursuit champion Ed Clancy of Rapha Condor JLT is one of the riders signed up to race the criterium, and once the action transfers to the grounds of the stately home on Saturday, he’ll also be among the riders taking part in the first ever HMT Shugborough Kermesse in the evening. His fellow Olympic gold medallist, Joanna Rowsell had also been due to race too but following her very nasty crash during the women's race at last weekend's Ride London event she has been ruled out with a broken collarbone.
That event starts at 6.15pm, with road closures – and no access to the Shugborough Estate – in place by 5.30pm.
Ahead of that, hundreds of amateur riders will have ridden another new event, the Staffordshire Goes Pedalling sportive, with route options of 35 and 70 miles; entries already full for both.
There’s also a Festival Fringe, with events in Stafford on Friday running till 4.30pm, when the racing starts, and at Shugborough Hall all day on Saturday – the latter including KMX tracks, described as “pedal powered cart racing”, basically they're three-wheeled recumbent trikes and very good fun to ride.
Friday’s racing programme in Stafford is:
4.30pm Town Centre Partnership Business Challenge
5.15pm Stafford Borough Council Hand Cycling
6.20pm Lewis Partnership Women's GP
8.00pm HMT Stafford GP
While last weekend’s first edition of Prudential RideLondon may have grabbed all the attention, the Staffordshire Cycling Festival is one of many smaller such events we’re noticing that demonstrate the growing interest in all things bike-related throughout the UK.
You can find full details of the weekend’s events on the festival website.
QUB has more than 20,000 students. Those 80 somewhat secure spaces are going to be putting in a lot of work. ...
Could it also be that the victim didnt have valid insurance/driving license or M.O.T so didnt report it in fear of themselves being investigated???...
You mean they called up one of their friends or family members to stump up the £7 to get it greenlit....
If the chains snap that is lack of build quality or material.....
"Wisdom is better than weapons of war, but one sinner destroys much good."
His life was only worth shy of 7 years ,that's too lenient in every book .Let alone drugged up and leaving him to die
2 years suspended...
I came here to basically write the same thing, the floating bus stop near me has a very narrow cycling lane between a very narrow pavement and a...
It wasn't an official consultation meeting - see my comment above.
Right, well that could be handy: I'm going round with my baseball bat to have a quiet chat about ownership. You can use their names to see if they...